Ink On Paper
by TigerLilly1995
Summary: "Fifty years from now when you're looking back at you life don't you want to be able to say you got in the car?" Yes; yes I did. He was offering me the adventure of a lifetime, a hope for a better future than this. He was giving me the opportunity which only the three of us, out of six billion people, were getting. Yes, I wanted to say I got in that car with him. Was it a mistake?
1. Chapter 1

**AN: hello everyone, welcome to ****Ink On Paper****. First thing first: This story is OC centric, and there will be a Canon/OC pairing. Also, before I forget: I would really like a beta reader for this story, so if you're interested, please PM me.**

**One more thing: there is an important AN at the end, so please don't ignore it. And I will try to reply to reviews in the beginning of every chapter.**

**Cover photo is what my OC looks like.  
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**I don't own Transformers, only my OC; enjoy!**

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_**Part one: Battle for the Allspark**_

_"Alright; good morning children! Welcome to grade one!" The teacher chirped happily, clapping her hands once. I stood in the doorway, watching the rest of the children settle down in their chairs, laughing and talking away and chirping with glee._

_I, on the other hand, stood in the doorway like a statue, not making a noise, staring at all of them in horror. I couldn't do it; I couldn't walk in there and talk to anyone. So instead, I turned around and inched away from the door and out into the hallway…_

_... Only to be grabbed by the arm. "And where do you think you're going?" the teacher says in that annoying sing-song voice. "Come on, let's go!" she sings, pulling me back inside. I trail after her reluctantly, keeping my gaze on the tile floor. "Come on now, take a seat. Here, you can sit right next to this lovely boy right here. I'm sure he won't mind," she tells me, sitting me down in front of a desk._

_I turn to the brunet boy next to me. He gives me a small, shy wave and I turn my face away in embarrassment, feeling my cheeks turn pink. I didn't look at him or anybody the whole class, but I felt guilty just ignoring him like that. He was trying to be nice to me, and I was neglecting him. It was very rude of me. I didn't want him to think that I was mean; I wasn't._

_"Hey," I whispered with my hand over my mouth. "I have some candy in my lunch bag, you want one?" I asked, my hand muffling my words. He turned to me, a wide smile on his face. He nodded his head happily, and I noticed that one of his front teeth were missing._

_When he saw that I saw that he didn't have a tooth, he quickly put his hands over his mouth, looking embarrassed. I knew that he felt awkward with a tooth missing; especially at the front. Everyone makes fun of you when you're missing teeth. I didn't want him to feel bad, so I leaned in and mumbled "I have a secret. Want to know it? But you have to promise to not tell anyone." With my hand still over my mouth, the words were muffled and hard to make out._

_He nods so I cup my hands around my mouth so no one other than him can see, and give him a big smile, showing both of my missing front teeth, an big gap where they used to be, only two weeks ago. I close my mouth, covering it with my hands again, and look down at my lap, my face red._

_But the boy smiles at me, a big smile. "I'm Sam. You want to be friends?" My eyes widen. I never had a friend before. I never talked to anyone because I was afraid that they would make fun of me, so I never made friends. I always played by myself all the time._

_"Do you really want to be friends?" I ask Sam, who nods. "Ya, it'll be fun! We can play hide and seek together!" he chirps happily, and I smile, still covering my mouth._

_"OK, let's be friends. I'm Raven."_

.oOo.

"So how about it? You in?"

"A lake party…? I… I don't know… maybe…? It's tomorrow, right?"

"Sam, Keala will be there, and I'm invited, and I'm inviting you; come on, it'll be fun." I didn't even need to mention that last part; I knew that the moment I said Keala will be there, he'd come. He's had a crush on her since seventh grade. It's really quite adorable.

"Uh… ya… I'll go. But I need to get a car first. How am I supposed to get this A with a crazy relative?" To tell the truth, sometimes, I wish I never offered Sam that Kit Kat that first day of school; more so in the past few days. This project is all Sam has been talking about for the past week. It's quite a big project, especially for the beginning of the year, and he couldn't talk about anything else. We'd sat in his room all evening, for several days, working on this. We looked through old journals and sailing records and everything, trying to make this as interesting as possible. And to be honest, it was pretty cool that his ancestor was the first to explore the North Pole, but he was crazy! It's really hard to get an A if your relative is crazy.

I did the project, but I didn't care about it. I just slapped a few things together with no care or worry for the mark. I could have made it brilliant presentation that would have gotten an A+, but I didn't. I'm not bragging, but I can work wonders with words on a page if I really want to. I wrote several short stories that I actually published; but I didn't bother now. I really don't care about the mark I get. I have only one future, and I don't need to get good marks in school for that.

I never really cared about my marks, and ever since becoming twelve, I had no one to look over my shoulder to ensure I was doing homework or drive me to school every morning to make it curtain that I was actually going there. So in conclusion, I couldn't care less how I did with this project – mainly because I really didn't give a shit about history – and spent my time helping Sam.

"Sam, relax; breathe," I tell him, inhaling through my nose, and exhaling through my mouth, and motioning for him to follow. "Yes, there you go; inhale..." breathing in, "and exhale…" breathing out. "There, see? You'll be just fine. We worked on this with you for two weeks, sometimes even into the night, and for the past three days, you've been practicing the presentation on in front of me and your bathroom mirror nonstop. You'll do great," I assure him cheerfully, with a smile.

"Besides, you have the whole day to mentally prepare for this." I make it sound like he's heading for an execution.

"Ya, either that or chicken out." I give him a look, raising my eyebrows – I never learned to rise one at a time. "Sam, are you kidding me? Aren't I the one who's afraid of being made fun of?"

"You're underestimating yourself. You haven't been like that for over three years." Ya, he's right. I use to be so shy that I couldn't say a word to anyone I didn't already know. But that all changed when Sam read some of my short stories and suggested I post one or two online. So I did and they got such great feedback that I got into it. And after a year, Sam got me to actually publish them – yes, I went public with them thanks to Sam, even though I kept myself anonymous. After that, I realized that I really didn't have anything to be afraid of. I had a talent with a pen and paper – not really; I typed everything on a laptop, but you get the point – when I really wanted to, and I had a few fans at my back, and my best friend to. People had my back, and anyone who wanted to make fun of me for anything could write it in a nice and neat little letter, roll the letter up, and shove it up their ass because no one cared.

Just then, the bell rang. "Come on Sam, you'll be alright."

"Ok, ya, you're right. Hey, _when_ I'm going to be buying my new car today," Sam says, pride and excitement filling his voice, "you wanna come? You can help me pick out a car." I give him a glare at him for that, but he just laughs. "No, I can't. I'd really like to, but I have things to do," I say. I had to clean the house – for once, just for the sake of making it look like a human lives there, not an ape. And then… I mentally shrug. I honestly don't know what then. I'll probably get on my laptop and write another chapter for my Buffy fan fiction – don't say a word; I started with fan fiction before anonymously becoming well known.

"Ok, whatever you want, but you just give me a call if anything, K?"

"Ya, sure. I gotta get to class," I say, hurrying off. I'm not sure why I left like that. I just ran away like I didn't want to talk to him. I instantly feel guilty about it, but keep walking to my first class: advanced computer science.

.oOo.

"Move; you're in my way." I turn to the left, giving Maggie a mockingly caring look. "Oh, I'm so sorry. You can wait until I'm done." I turn back to my locker, opening the door to a full ninety degree angle, so I can't see her. She just opens my locker door further, so I can see her. Rolling my eyes, I turn to the blonde; her hair yet again dyed a different shade. Today, it was honey blonde, and curled with what I believe to be a three inch curler. She is such a princess – and I don't mean that in the good way.

"What do you want?" I ask in a bored tone, and wishing to be anywhere but here.

"For you to move away from my locker, geek." I get my gym bag and shut my locker, turning to face her. I can't say I hate her or anything, and it isn't like I'm the only one she picks on. And besides, if she wants to be bitchy, than sure, whatever, I'll live, but she's just so _annoying_! "What's your problem, Maggie? What did anyone do to you, to make you such a pain? Can't you get over whatever insecurities you have and be a human being for once?"

"Mind your one business, little geek, and move out of my way," She sneers. What, 'geek' is all she can come up with? "Maggie, you've been calling me a geek since grade three; can't you come up with a better name?" She can't call me slut because I wear jeans and T-shirts or middle sleeved shirts, and that's usually what she goes with, to largely bring down self-esteem and make you feel like a teas or whatever.

She glares at me like a lion, spotting its prey. Not a very good look to get from her. I know that next week is going to be a nightmare.

"Listen here-"

"-I'm all ears," I interrupt stupidly, and instantly regret it. 'Listen here' is supposed to be intimidating, and in all honesty, with that glare, it is; like seriously creepy. And I already know that if I say another word, she'll beat me up _big-time_. And her cousin is a kick-boxer, so I shrink into myself against the locker, trying to make myself invisible. My brave act fades away, and my heart rate goes up as she stares me down. I give a small nod, getting the hint and, with a barely audible whimper, power-walk away with my head down, nose to the floor.

Why did I have to act all brave? I mean, I can act brave, and I can _be_ brave… well… brave_ish_, but not with her and her cousin. Jen already beat me up once, and it's not an experience I'd like to repeat.

My head bowed, I head to gym. I can't wait to get home and get my hands on my writing. I love writing and I write all the time in my spare time. I actually skip school sometimes, just to stay home and write all day. And then the school calls and I have to pretend to be mom and talk to them. And they ask why I miss so much classes and I have to give them some lame excuse.

It's no bother though. I'd been doing that since I was twelve, so it's all practiced.

Argh! Why did I have to talk back to Maggie? She's a kitty with one sharp set of claws. She's not the person to mess with and I should know that by now! Why am I such an idiot?

.oOo.

I shove the door open for the third time, and it finally opens. So suddenly, though, that I end up on the floor in a second, my bag open, and my stuff all over the carpeted floor. With an irritated growl, I push myself off the ground, picking my stuff up, and kick the door shut with my foot as hard as I can. However, it still gets stuck half way into closing, so I have to lean on it with all my weight to close it shut. It's always been getting stuck like that. It's ridiculous, really, and a little funny, after seven years of living in this house. I never bothered to get it fixed. And why should I? It's only a minor, beyond annoying inconvenience; not like I can't handle it.

I sigh and drop my school bag on the floor next to the front door and look around the microscopic living room. The living room is smaller than my bedroom – which is a shoebox – and it's even smaller now. Clothes on the floor and couch, shoes and socks lying wherever there is space, several layers of dust on the TV, the remote nowhere in sight; old newspaper laying everywhere it can, and the window is spider-webbed with cracks from those blasted kids and their habit of playing soccer right in front of my little shed of a house.

I kick my jean Converse off, leaving then in front of the door and place both hands on my hips. Not to state the obvious, but this is the messiest living room I had ever seen: scribbles on the wall from when I was ten, bottles of coke crumpled up and thrown at the wall, leaving marks on the yellow-stained space over the TV from my little target practice.

Biting my lip, I walk down the hall, to the kitchen, which looks no better. If anything, it looks worse. Fruit and vegetable peals on the counters, along with paper, used paper towels, half-eaten bread, cookie crumbs, bitten up apples, week-old juice, and a sky-high pile of dirty dishes in the sink; egg shells from breakfast on the stove, and pans.

I scratch my head slowly. I need to clean this up. Yes, I'll clean it up… tomorrow. Ya, I'll do it tomorrow. How many times had I said that I'd clean up tomorrow? More than I can count.

So instead, I go back to the living room, swing my bag over my shoulder, and tug on the door handle… and yet again nothing, so I push put my foot on the wall, and push off.

_CRASH_

My butt hits the floor painfully as the door wildly swings open. Getting up with a pained grunt, I brush myself off I shake my head. Oof; that didn't tickle.

I leave the house, forcefully pulling the door shut behind me, and head to the park. It's a good three miles away, and that's good. The farther it is away from this trashcan of a neighborhood, the better; I really wouldn't prefer my house to be found by anyone I do or do not know.

I leave left the old, single-bedroom, poor excuse for a residence and I'm mid-way down my front lawn when I stop and turn around to look at it.

Dirty, chapped, white paint, covered in stains varying on color from vomit-yellow, to coffee-brown – don't even ask about that one. The roof falling apart and covered the leaves the huge, old tree in the yard has shed. The windows are also in desperate need of a cleaning and so is the screen door. The yard is untended; weeds growing everywhere you look and the flower bed in under my bedroom window is beaten and turned upside down by the neighbor's dog. They keep scolding Ripper for digging up my tulips, and chewing up the doormat like a cat, but I always tell them to leave it. I don't have time for tending my property, so once every few months I have to hire someone to do it for me. But no matter what they do, they can't get the blobs of whatever it is off the exterior walls of my house, for fix the cracked cement stairs leading up to the front door.

Even Sam doesn't know where I live; I was keeping it a secret from him especially. I can't let him know I live in a place like this. We have our secrets, obviously, and our lies. It isn't like we tell each other everything there is to know about the other. And I know that lies will only lose you friends – especially if Sam is my only friend; I don't have the guts to get more – but he just can't know.

I clean my mind of any though, and walk the five miles to the park.

.oOo.

Back… and forth… back… and forth. I swing my legs back and forth, the swing going back and forth with them. The sun beat down at my back, burning my neck as I swung – for the past hour. It was already like eight in the evening, but it was still really hot outside. Earphones in my ears, I sing along to a song. And by some unearthly sorcery, tears were steadily rolling down my cheeks with every word leaving my lips. I hadn't cried in years, but I was crying now, in the empty swing park, in the setting sun. I was crying for no reason, yet every reason in the world.

"When I was younger… I told my mother… I said 'one day, I'm gonna make you proud'." I can't believe this. I can't believe how accurate that is. I told her that I'd grow up to be the best I can be. I said that she would be the proudest mom ever. I said I'd be daughter of the year. I'd have good grades, and many friends. I'd get over my insecurities and find the guts to do something.

"Now that I'm older… it's so much harder… to say those words out loud." I never achieved any of that. I never became a model student or model citizen. I never got good grades or made any friends, and my only friend that I'm brave enough to have doesn't even know where I live. I get into fights and get suspended; I get in trouble with the law and get in with all the wrong people. My house is a mess; my life is an even _bigger_ mess. I can't hold a job, I can't test well. Admit it: it won't be too long before I go into drugs and alcoholism. I'll never be able to look mom in the eye. How can I, after what I'd promised her, and miserably broke ever word I'd given her?

"You're growing taller… a little smarter… and one day, you're gonna leave home." I'm not always going to live in this trashcan of a place. But when I do leave my parents' house, where am I gonna go? I'm gonna be stuck in just as much a hellhole as I am now, if not worse. If I leave, I'm bound to throw my life away, trading it for alcohol, to find closure, after what my life – which could have been good – turned out to be.

"Or will you look like… your mother's father… oh when you are fully grown?" My dad's side of the family was always fortunate, all the way back to my great-great-great-great grandfather. My mom's, on the other hand, wasn't like that. She made something of herself, but her dad was more like what I am right now. He couldn't hold a job, slept till noon, and smelled like a rat. Her mother got her out of there, away from that man, but that's beside the point. The point is, right now, I look an awful lot like him. I'm a disaster of the highest order.

"When I was younger… I asked my father 'why are we so human?'." I couldn't understand many things, like why, even with all our money, we lived where we did. Why we never bothered to look better and lead better lives. We had the opportunity, but we never took it – well… _they_ never took it, I didn't have much of a say in the matter.

"Now that I'm older… I think I figured it out: We're just doing what we can." There is only so much they could do. It isn't that they could afford anything as much as that they simply couldn't afford the time. Taking care of a big house wasn't an option, so they had to think small. They had to keep everything to a minimum, in order to fit their lives into the ever-so-tight schedule. They just couldn't do anything about the way I lived because their plate was full as it was.

But I wanted to be better than that.

"Because I won't… I won't let you down, I won't let you… I won't… I won't let you down, oh now… I won't… I won't let you down, I won't let you… I won't I won't let you down." I promised to never let either of them down; promised to be the best I can be and climb out of this. I made a promise, and I promised to never let them down. I wanted to be better.

"When I was younger… I told my mother… I said 'one day, I'm gonna make you proud'." Be that isn't an option; not anymore.

I let them down so badly. Look at me: I'm the world's biggest lair.

_HONK, HONK!_

I jump, and buy doing so, lose grip on the swing, and crash to the sand, my face buried in it. I get up on all four, shaking my head, and wipe my face before turning around.

"Thought I'd find you here!" It takes me a moment to understand, but reality catches up with me and my face lights up like a Christmas tree. "SAM!" I shout joyfully, all traces of sadness gone. I turn off my music and stand up my full, not too tall height. "You got it! You got a car!"

"I got a car!" he shouts back, his voice full of joy and pride, as he gets out of the car, arms out in either direction, and I run into them and we jump up and down as we did when we were little kids when something awesome happened. I squeal like a little girl, from happiness. "Oh my god! Sam, I told you you'd get it! See; there was nothing to worry about!"

"I got my first car!"

"You got your first car! Oh my god, did you test-drive it yet?!"

"No! I wanted to do that with you!" I freeze in mid air, my feet hitting the ground, but not leaving it again. Since we're in an embrace, this stops Sam's jumping as well, and I look up at him in wonder. "You… you really wanted to test-drive it with me?" I ask in disbelief. I know we're best friends, but I didn't really expect that our friendship was like this. Sam was so excited to drive the first car – he saw it as a special moment, which I guess it was (I don't have a car, I bus to and from school) – but I didn't expect he'd want to share that with me. "Of course, silly; what did you think? We're best friends, remember?" I give him the most brilliant of smiles, my heart singing. It's not like I thought I was unimportant – I know my worth, thank you very much – I just didn't know our friendship really meant this much to him. We joked about being brother and sister all the time, but I thought those were just jokes.

Clearly not, and I couldn't be more grateful to that.

"Ya, and before we test-drive it, we need to refill the gas. Come on, you'll love it!" Sam exclaimed in glee, tugging on my arms as he lead me to the passenger seat.

"Sam, wait… what kind of car is this?"

"What? Oh, right, uh… it's a Camaro. It's from the mid-seventies, I think."

"Wow… it's almost old enough to be my dad. That's one old car; antique, very nice… I think. Are these racing stripes or something?"

"Ya, apparently, it's been in a race."

"No way! Oh god; it might be an old car, but if Trent finds out that it used to race, he's gonna turn blue from jealousy!" I squeal. He has a really nice car, like… _really_ nice, but it's never been on a racetrack. If Sam's car has been racing… "That's awesome!" I jump up and down, clapping my hands at the same time.

"M' lady," Sam says with a deep bow as he holds the door open for me, gesturing for me to enter. I give a curtsy, and get in the car, Sam closing the door behind me, and I let out a playful giggle. Sam gets into the drivers seat, turning the key, and the car revs to life, almost _eagerly_, and we pull away from the park.

"How did you know you'd find me here?" I ask.

"Raven, I know you well." Sam, if only you knew how wrong you were. Actually, on second thought, keep your knowledge limited to what it is right now; it's better than way. "And besides, you told me you came here when you were upset, a few years back. And this morning, you didn't look in a very good mood, and after school, I called your name, and you didn't turn around. You don't do that unless something serious happened." Wow, he _does_ know me. And… he remembered what I said about the park? Wow.

"Um… thanks. And I'm sorry. I didn't mean to ignore you today."

"It's ok; we all have our days. You just know that I'm right here of you need me," I assures me. I look at him, and he's already looking at me, sincerity in his eyes. I give him a grateful smile, nodding.

"Thanks." Sam doesn't push it, asking me what happened. He knows me that well that he knows I won't tell him, no matter how much he asks. I can't believe I'm friends with him.

Sometimes, I feel that I don't deserve him. I mean, I can't even be honest with him. How can I deserve his loyalty if I can't even tell him where I live or what's going on in my life? Am I even a good friend? Friends trust each other with anything, and he's proven himself loyal and trustworthy countless times, and yet, I still can't bring myself to tell him.

He makes me question myself on a daily basis, but I never find the answer.

Suddenly, I wild, and so-very-random idea pops into my head. "Hey Sam?"

"Yup?" He asks, not getting his eyes off the road. "After that tank, can you take us out to the highway? I wanna try something," I say with a grin. This is the worst idea ever.

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**AN: OK, guys, this story depends on you! No, I mean it. I have the plot planed out, but it branches out ****two ways****.**

**_First option_****: this is a Sam/OC story, which is not something that is common.**

**_Second option_****: this is an Optimus/OC story.**

**I have both plots planed, but I want to know what kind of story you want to hear. You can vote in the reviews or by PM, and I will post the results every chapter. I'm thinking to make the vote four of five chapters long, and I will update once a week, so vote fast, if you want the story turn out your way!**

**Anyway, I hope you like the chapter, have a great (time of day goes here). *waves and a cheesy smile***


	2. Chapter 2

**AN: this chapter is only the second chapter but ****_damn_**** it's long. My chapters are usually about three thousand words long – fairly long – but this one is ****_twice that_****! But I just sat down this morning, and wrote and wrote and wrote, as I shuffled the songs on my phone, and I couldn't stop. I don't usually update every day, so don't expect it too often.**

**Anyway; krikanalo: Thank you. And to the people who favorited and followed my story: thank you.**

**I'm sorry for spelling/grammar error, because this chapter is seriously long, and I couldn't get all of them – proofreading your own work is hard and you can't ever get everything.**

**Guys, that vote is still on:**

**First option: make this a Sam/OC story**

**Second option: make this an Optimus/OC story. If you want that paring you like most, you better vote, either in the reviews or PM me and I will tally it up. This is your chance to steer the story in the direction of a paring with the character you like most, so vote!**

**I don't own Transformers, only Raven; enjoy :D**

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"Wait, wait, wait!" I call out hurryingly, getting out of the car, my phone already in front of my face. "Hold, on, stay where you are and don't move!" I chirp childishly as I run to take place in front of my best friend. "Hold still…" I trail off, holding the hone up, and try a few different angles, before changing positing a few degrees to the right. Sam stands, unmoving; with the gas nozzle in the car… gas thing, whatever it's called, and a hand on his hip. I try a few more angles and locations before I get the perfect view, and take a picture, the sun shining in just the right way. Sam's washed the car already, with his dad, so even though it was old and the yellow paint was a weird shade, and on top of that, all chapped and faded. And ya, it isn't exactly a car of dreams, but it drives, and it's a car. I don't have a car, so who am I to judge?

And I have to admit, as old as the car looks, it's isn't half bad. The 'old' look actually gives it a personality, in a way. It looks unique in a way… maybe… I guess.

I take the photo, and excitedly return back to Sam, showing him the photo. "This is going to be your caller ID!" I chirp roundly, getting a laugh from Sam. "Ok, your turn. Stand right here," Sam tells me, pulling me into place. "Here, lean against the car in some awesome pose. Put your left hand on your hip and lean on your left leg. Oh, and pull your hair over to the right." I do as he instructs – as he jogs away – taking my dark brown hair out the ponytail, telling the curls fall over my right shoulder and shift my weight, putting on a bright smile.

"Ya, there, that looks great." After a moment, Sam's running back to me, shoving the phone in my face. "No, wait, wait, wait; I can't see," I say, leaning back against the car when the phone comes too close to my face. I take Sam's hands, pulling it away for a better look at the picture. "Wow; I look good." I really do; the picture looks really nice.

"Yup, and it's going on my phone as your contact photo," Sam smirks. "OK so, what did your crazy brain come up with? I doubt it's anything good." Sam mutters the last part and I laugh in agreement.

"Oh Sam… you have no idea. Let's go out on the highway." It's only eight ten, so we have plenty of time, and the sunset will give it a nice effect. Oh god, I'd always wanted to do this! I almost jump in excitement as we get in the car and pull away from the gas station.

It isn't long before we're on the empty highway. I get my bag from the back seat, getting a CD out of it, and Sam's face lights up at the sight. "OK, Sam, I'll turn some music on… can you make the car go faster?" I turn on my favorite road trip song and Sam speeds up. Oh God; I'm going to die today. These are my last moments of living! Oh well; let's make them the best they can be. I turn the music to full blast, a smile spreading over my face, and I do the craziest thing ever:

I stick my head out the window, squinting because of the wind, and pull myself out, pushing off of the seat and holding on to the roof for dear life. "Wow, wow, wow! Raven, what the hell are you doing?!"

"Chill out, Sam!" I cry out over the noise, heart racing in fear, palms – oh dear God, why? – sweating. Oh boy; please don't let me slip! OH God! I'm so freaking _scared_!

I push myself further out the window, clawing at the roof to stay on it and place my sneakers on the window, standing up and _oh so carefully_ crawl onto the roof, my heart doing a drum roll in my ears at a deafening volume. And as expected, I begin to shake in fear as the wind pushes my backward. I grab on to the front of the car for dear life, inching to the windshield and sit down, my legs hanging on it.

_This is the scariest thing I've ever done_! What the hell was I thinking?!

I gulp my fear down, and ever-so-carefully slide down the windshield until my back side hits the hood of Sam's car, my back pressed against the windshield.

I turn my face to the side, looking at Sam from the corner of my eye, to see him wearing a horrified expression. Instantly, all fear al but vanishes, a brilliant smile lighting my face, and I let out a scream. But not in fear, but in joy, and at the stupidity of the situation. Here I am, on the hood of a car, music blasting.

Oh I had dreamed of doing this!

**_"YA!"_** I scream, closing my eyes, arms in the air. **_"WOOOOOOO!"_** I can't believe I'm doing this! Heart racing, adrenaline pumping, I screech out in absolute bliss, loving every second.

I can fly! I'm free of everything! I'm_ flying_! I can't believe this; I'm actually flying! This is my dream!

I let out another cry, throwing my arms to the air. "I'm free!" I scream, eyes closed, wind in my face, pressing me further into the glass. I'm _alive_! I've never felt more energized before, never felt more alive than I am now!

_"It's my life, it's now or never_  
_I ain't gonna live forever_  
_I just want to live while I'm alive_

_It's my life_  
_My heart is like the open highway_  
_Like Frankie said I did it my way_  
_I just wanna live while I'm alive_  
_It's my life"_

I screech along with the lyrics, feet fighting to stay on the hood, back arching up, arms out, living like never before. I can't believe I did this! I actually did it!

"Oh my God! Woooooo-" my shriek is cut shirt, and I begin to choke. My eyes widen and my hand flies to my throat, picking at it, as if I can reach whatever is in there. I slowly turn to Sam, my mouth hanging open, eyes full of fear again. I gasp for air, and as I do, I try desperately, to tell Sam to not slow down one bit. OH god… this is so beyond disgusting! E-… ew! I can feel it trying to crawl up!

My face wrinkles, like as if I'd just swallowed a lemon and I edge to the right, leaning over the edge, and vomit a little, making a weird sound in the back of my throat.

This is nasty: I swallowed a bug! "I swallowed a bug!" I shout to Sam, and it only takes him a second to start laughing like he's insane. I shoot him a glare and knock on the glass, signaling him to slow down ever so carefully.

.O.o.O.o.O.

"Raven, you're nuts! You have no idea how scared I was!" Sam shouts at me. I lean back, taking a seat on the hood of his car, arms cross. "Well Sam, I think it's safe to say that I was even more scared," I state, "but I had to do it; at least once! Sam, that was so amazing! It was totally, absolutely the best! And oh my god, I was so terrified! I thought I was going to die, I didn't know if I'd live to see tomorrow! But no, I lived! I lived and that was the worst choice I ever made and it was the best idea ever!" I squeal, babbling on uncontrollably on and on until Sam makes a 'shut up' motion with his hand.

"Ok, I get it. But you're still insane. I should take you to a hospital; yes, right now, get in the car, I'm taking you to a hospital; let's go," He says, grabbing my hand, and dragging me to the passenger seat. He yanks at the door… and it doesn't open. He frowns and tugs at the handle once more. Still, nothing happens. "What? It isn't _locked_!" Sam says in exasperation. I look at the door, seeing the internal locks, or whatever they're called not locked. The door will just not open.

"Sam, come on, stop it. I'm fine; see? Come on. Hey, I know a place nearby: a pond. Come on, it's only a few minutes' drive away. I might be crazy, but hey… let's be crazy together," I say with a smirk. Sam looks at me as if I'd lost it, and I start begging. "Please Sam! Come on! This evening, let's be stupid again. Let's do something completely irrational and childish that if someone sees us, they'll send us to the insane asylum. It's eight-forty, and the sun is setting. Look around: it's beautiful and you're an idiot to pass up an opportunity. _Please_!" Plead, giving him the best puppy dog face I can – which is pretty sad.

Sam shakes his head. Nope; not gonna happen." Alright… you asked for it, young man.

.O.o.O.o.O.

"Dear lord, it's _freezing_!" I screech as I pop out of the water, arms wrapped around me. My T-shirt sticks to my body, along with my jeans. I wipe the water out of my face, gasping at the cold, but as soon as I open my mouth, cold water splashes me in the face. My jaw falls, eye wide. I freeze like a statue, arms out in shock.

"Admit it: you were asking for it. You were the one who dragged me into th-" I cut him off by splashing his face with water as hard as I can, which isn't really that hard at all. I'm not all that strong at all.

I raise my eyebrows at him, tilting my head to the side and smirking. "You asked for it," I teas. But my victory is short-lived. Sam jumps on me, pushing me underwater. I scream in surprise, cutting myself off when I realize I'm under water, and screaming isn't such a great idea. I close my mouth and try to swim up, and two hands push me down, holding me under water.

I begin to struggle, trashing around like a maniac, trying to push myself up to the surface, but it's hopeless. Then I realize I screamed all my air out. I stop struggling, holding whatever is left of my breath, and float motionlessly. And as expected0, the hands grab a hold of my arm, and pull me out of the water. "Oh God, Raven, are you ok? You were not moving and-"

I cut Sam off by splashing him in the face again, and burst into laughing. "Are you ever going to _not_ fall for that?" I laugh cheerfully, and all but tackle him into the water, holding him there, but for my lack of swimming practice, Sam instantly gets the upper hand, and I'm once again, the one being drowned by my best friend.

I burst through the water, gasping for air. "Not fair!" I scream at Sam, "You know I can't swim!" I'm not afraid of water; I just never learned how to swim.

"Hey! You're the one who came up with the idea!" Sam fires back, so I splash him in the face… only to be splashed right back. I scream in frustration and start splashing Sam over and over again, as hard as I can, not leaving him any room to fight back. My only mistake was shutting my eyes and turning away, just in case he splashed me.

Why? Because something grabbed my foot, making my shriek, and pulled me under water, holding me there. Hey! That's not fair!

I pop back out of the water, breathing heavily.

"Raven? It's late, we'll have to go home soon… but we're all wet," Sam says with an eye-roll. Ya, he's right. It's getting late and we better go home.

We climb out of the pond, crashing tiredly on the grass, breathing heavily. "You're crazy," Sam says, giving me a look, which I return with, "I might be crazy, but you still hang out with me, which makes you twice as crazy," with a smirk.

"Dude, we can't go home like this. First: the car; there is no way I'm getting into my car all wet, and second: my parents will kill me. This was a terrible idea. It's all your fault."

"Yup, my fault; but you followed me, making you just as bad if not worse." Oh God I love doing this! "And don't worry; I know how we can dry quickly," I say, getting to my feet. Sam looks at me, confused, but gets up as well. The moment he's up, I lightly hit his shoulder. "Tag! You're it!" I scream, and bolt for it, knowing that he might not exactly be a sports kind of person, but he's still faster than me.

_"Guess this means you're sorry, you're standing at my door_  
_Guess this means you take back all you said before_  
_Like how much you wanted anyone but me_  
_Said you'd never come back but here you are again_

_'Cause we belong together now, yeah_  
_Forever united here somehow, yeah_  
_You got a piece of me and honestly_  
_My life would suck without you_"

It takes me a second to understand what's going on, but when I finally do, I stop, and turn around to look at the car, which is playing Kelly Clarkson's 'My Life Would Suck Without You'. I do a double-take, but the distraction causes me being tackled to the ground and pinned down but my arms and legs. "Not fair! I got distracted! Your car started playing music!" I squeal, trying to get free.

"Ya, well, my car is all weird and stuff, and now the distraction is going to be something you regret forever. This is for scaring me by climbing out of my moving car."

"Oh, so we're back to that?"

"Oh ya." And with that, he throws his head back, making a disgusting sound in the back of his throat. It takes me a second to understand, and as soon as I do, I scream and starts thrashing wildly, trying to get free. Only to freeze when Sam's spit hangs inches from mi face. I try pushing myself into the ground as far as I can, flinching away to the side as I keep screaming. "NO-O-O! Don't you d-dare!" But he dares and a moment later, the spit _falls_ in my _face_. I let out a murderous screech. "Sam, I strongly advise you to run; run as far and as fast as you can." His face falls, eyes widening. "Oh crap," is all I hear before I jump to my feet, darting after him. "You'll pay for this, you little freak!"

.oOo.

After picking me up at the park at six, Sam and I drove to his friend's house. The friend... let's just say that every time I talk to Miles, I get a gut feeling that he hides some sort of drug under his bed, because I swear, the guy is stoned or something half the time. Then again, it isn't like I know what's going on with him back home, so maybe there is a reason why he's a stoned weirdo. Nonetheless, he's embarrassing.

Again, it isn't like I can really judge him. I mean, I'm two, completely different people: one being a miserable seventeen-year-old who lives in a garbage can, and the other being the craziest and most fun girl in the world, a girl who take the dumbest risks and ends up in tones of trouble, but to me, it's all worth it. I can be a stoned weirdo sometimes, too.

So when we park in front of the said boy's house, I unlatch the seatbelt, and carefully climb over to the back seat, giving Miles a turn to ride in the front, since I already had. Before long, the blonde haired boy comes running out the front door.

"Yo, dude! You got a new car? Sweet!" Miles calls out in a slightly distant voice. "Wow dude, it's old. And like… the paint is all weird and cracked. And how old is it? It looks as old as my dad." I's not old, it's antique, Miles, and do you see me bitching about your hair and taste in fashion? No? Then quit putting Sam's new car down. First cars are supposed to look like this.

But I don't say anything. I just frown in displease from the back seat, and listen to the two teens go back and forth about the car. "Give it up, Miles; at least I _have_ a car, so get in if you want a ride." Miles finally climbs in, and I begin one of the longest car rides of my lifetime. So I just lay in the back seat, contemplating on the universe and the meaning of life and the universe and everything. Surprise, surprise; the answer is forty-two, just as it always is. I need to go on a job hunt tomorrow. I can't this evening because I'm going to be at the party, obviously, but since it's a long weekend, I can go tomorrow. And I also have Geo homework. Argh! I don't want to do homework. Maybe I should just say my house was burned down; then I can get away with not have a tone of homework done.

But then for the excuse to work, my house will really need to be burned down, so I can't use that excuse. Great; let's see what else I can come up with.

Oh boy; first month of the school year, and I'm already falling behind. I still need to pay for water and electricity, and the bus I take to school; oh and let's not forget I still owe money to summer school. Oh dear God; what am I doing with my life? I can't believe I'm actually letting this happen to me. I'm better than this; I know that. I know I could be better.

Then why aren't I doing anything? Because I'm lazy, that's why. I'm incompetent and have no willpower in me to make me do things.

"Dude, are you _sure_ we're invited to this party?" brings me out of my thoughts. Thank God! I was already getting too lost in them. I hate thinking about my life. It's messy enough as it is, without of me confusing myself further.

"Mile, I'm invited, so I invited Sam… who invited you," I say; that last part being regretful. Miles is just going to embarrass us both, I just know it.

"Beside, Miles, it's a lake; public property." I laugh at that. "Sam, the sandbox was public as well and yet, Trent always kicked you out of it, back when we were in grade one. Oh, and he kicked you off the swings – literally – and the trampoline, and-"

"- Ok, we get it!" Sam cuts me off, and I snicker. We pull up to the curb and Sam's demeanor changes. "Oh my god; Oh my god guys, Mikaela's here." Ya genius, it's kind of why you came here, remember? You came here so you can impress her.

"Sam, relaxed, ok? Just breathe; you'll be fine," I say encouragingly. I mean, Mikaela may not have been my first choice for Sam, but underneath all of her snarky attitude and the beautiful hair and skillfully applied makeup, she's an insecure girl. She made bad choices, yes, but she wasn't a bad person. Underneath everything, she was just lost and looking for the right way. She put up a brave face for everyone, made herself tough.

I smile at the thought. She might not be a good person, but she isn't a bad person either. Miles and Sam get you, and Sam helps me out of the car. I straighten my striped blue-grey shoulder shirt and shorts, and Sam straightens his own shirt.

"Ok, Miles, just don't do anything weird." Ya, good luck with that, Sam. "Hey, Raven, I'm good?"

"Huh? Oh, ya hold on," I say, crossing over to him and straighten his shirt more, fixing the collar. "There, now you're good," I say with a smile. "OH and Sam? Did you have to park in front of Trent? You're just asking for it, you know." Trent's been getting at Sam for all eternity now, and now Sam had yet another reason to be picked on: an old car.

I watch the said teen toss a football to one of his buddies, getting the attention of the group. "Hey guys, check it out," Trent says, turning to us, leaning on his car, a smug expression on his face. I resist the urge to roll my eyes at him. Now don't get me wrong, I'm no saint, but I try to hold my temper with people as long as possible before losing it and becoming a real bitch.

And no, I _don't_ let people walk all over me, but I do try to show them that I couldn't care less about them and their pathetic lives by simply ignoring all the remarks they give me – but that only happens half the time; the other half… well let's just say it isn't my proudest characteristic.

Mikaela comes up behind him, wrapping her arms around his chest and giving him a well plaid fake smile.

"Hey bro!" Trent calls out to Sam, who I instantly feel tense up next to me, "that car! It's nice," He says, his voice sarcastic. Sam turns back to look at his car, and I feel him hurt. I though, keep my gaze on Mikaela, smiling a little when I see her gaze fly to her boyfriend's car for the briefest moment, her eyes saying 'well, it's better than your car'. She's something of a car genius. Problem there is, she know a lot about something, but it's frowned down upon.

Men are sexist jerks.

I bury my face in my hands, as Miles decides climbing a tree isn't weird, thus it's ok. I fight back the urge to pull him down off of it. God this boy is embarrassing.

Trent comes up to us from around his car, smirking at Sam, who tries to look anywhere but Trent. I want to tell him to just ignore Trent, but know that it will only give Trent the more reason to make fun of him. I suddenly feel like everyone is watching us, and become highly uncomfortable under all the pairs of eyes. I slow down, standing a little behind Sam, trying to hide the fact that I'm actually hiding behind him.

"So what are you guys doing here?" Trent asks broadly, looking for something to put Sam down for. I feel Sam tense further and resist the urge to place a reassuring hand on his shoulder. Come one Trent, it's getting old already. Get over yourself, and grow up.

Oh man; who am I to tell anyone to grow up? Raven, have you seen where you live lately? First, why don't you become perfect yourself, and then you can judge people.

Sam hesitates for a brief moment, shooting Miles a concealed glare, pursing his lips. "We're here to climb this tree," He says, and I can hear the embarrassment clearly in his voice. Trent, please stop this. Sam didn't do anything to you; he doesn't deserve this. Stop being a jerk.

"I-I see that; it looks fun," Trent says, half sarcastically, and even half pitifully. Ya, Trent feels pitiful for us over Miles, who is mounting a tree trunk. This has got to be the saddest thing ever. I feel my face flare up, a bright shade of red and I hide myself behind Sam, who I can practically hear saying "thanks for the support".

"You know s- I thought I recognized you: you tried out for the football team last year, right?" Oh for the love of God; Trent! Ya, Sam tried out for the football team in grade ten; he wanted to impress Mikaela that way. Nope, sports are out of his league – well, actual sports; he's actually really good at video games. You'd think that – knowing me – I'd be really good, and technically, I am, but he beats me in every game we try; no exceptions.

"Oh! No, no, no; that wasn't like… a real tryout." Nice one – note the sarcasm. "I was researching a book I was writing. "Ok, now I'm confused. Trent's face lights up like a child's on Christmas Eve.

"Oh ya?"

"Ya," Sam replies, nodding in embarrassment. I'm sorry Sam, I really want to step in, but I know I'll only make everything worse! I'm so sorry!

"Ya, what's it about? Sucking at sports?" Trent, Please, I am begging you, leave him be; he did nothing to deserve this! Just get over yourself already! Quit being such a revolting jerk; it's not fair to Sam!

Sam presses his lips into a tight line, looking mortified. He gives a small, nervous laugh, but I hear determination behind it. Oh no, I don't like that. Sam, what are you up to? "No, it's about the link between brain damage and football." My hand flies to my wide-open mouth, slapping it shut very loudly. I… cannot… _believe_ he just said that!

Trent looks like he's about to beet Sam up, but Sam keeps going, though losing his nerve considerably. "No-no, it's a _good_ book; you're friends will love it." My other hand flies to my mouth, trying to keep my laugh back. Wow Sam, where were you last night? Did you see ask the wizard of Oz to give you courage? I'd never heard Sam say anything like that before! I mean, he took the bullying like a champ, always keeping a straight face and not breaking down in fear like most do – yet anything thing I love about him – but never something like this! Too bad I had a gut feeling that none of this was going to end well for him.

"It's got mazes in it; you know… little coloring section… popup pictures… a lot of fun." Buy this point, Sam lost his guts and was now winging it and trying to think of a way out of being beat up publicly. But I have to give him credit: that was pretty damn good!

"That's funny." Trent is about to beat the living daylight out of him. He takes a step forward, to Sam, and I step in this time, seeing as Mikaela got in the way first. I stood, facing Sam, my hands up. "Sam, forget it; he's not worth the calories you waist, talking to him."

Behind me, I hear Mikaela trying to stop Trent. Sam takes a step back, and I feel Trent do tha same. I turn around, giving him a look, but he winks at me.

"Looking good in those shorts there," he says provocatively.

Like I said, my patience only goes so far. "Trent," I say, pressing my palms together in front of my chest, "Yes, you're a hotty, and yes, we've all long since established that you have a gigantic dick, but that's because you _are_ a dick. I will sleep with you when it rains cows and hell freezes over."

Ok, none of that actually happened. Well… it did but, you know… in my head. In real life, it was more like this:

I give a nervous and more than awkward laugh, wrapping my arms around myself. "Eh… ok. I'll just uh… go now… right over there; by the car with the big color-I-I mean the _bright_ color, Sam's car… ya… I'll just go now." And then nervously hurry away, climbing into the car as quickly as humanly possible and hide in the back seat.

"Oh my god, I can't believe I said that!" I whisper-shout in an overly high-pitch voice. "Oh dear lord; why? Why was I given the curse of social awkwardness? I'm humiliated! I'll never be able to show my face in public again! I'm done for; embarrassed beyond any hope of being _un_embarrassed!" I hide my face in my hands and stupidly begin to slightly sob. I have personally _always_ – like, my whole life – been paranoid as hell of rape – and I know I'm not the only one. If I'm walking home late, in the dark, through a neighborhood like mine, all I can ever think of is 'oh my god, please anything happen to me; please don't let me be raped.

And sexual harassment – like a minute ago – quite honestly wasn't anything overly new. I have to admit that I'm pretty; I really am. But that always seems to work against me. And whenever someone does something that so much as suggests that they want me, I get excitedly paranoid, and afraid, and walk away, acting like an idiot, because that's how I act when I'm nervous. And I _know_ that the 'right' think to do is to tell someone, but let's face it: when have I ever done the right thing?

So instead of standing up to a bully, like all those movies – which are full of crap, by the way – or be like Sam and think of a witty comeback, I act like a freak and hide. How very brave of you, Raven; you make me proud.

I pear out from behind the driver's seat, looking out the windshield, just in time to see Mikaela shove Trent out of the way, and walk away like a boss. Did she just… dump him? Wow, good job. Sam and Miles come over, Miles climbing – no, literally, _climbing_ – in through the window, as Sam comes to lean against the driver's door.

I roll my eyes st Miles, choosing to not say anything over embarrassing myself further.

_"Who's gonna drive you home…"_ I jump, staring at the radio as it comes to life. _"… Tonight…"_

"Man what's wrong with your radio?" Miles asks a little distantly. Ya, what _is_ wrong with the radio. Oh well, it might be broken, but it's broken in a good way, because it's right. "Sam…" I start. "… I'm gonna drive her home tonight," the boy in question finishes and I smile.

"What? She's an evil jock concubine man, let her hitchhike." Hitchhike? She lives ten mile away! "She lives ten miles from here, ok?" Sam says, echoing my thoughts, "It's my only chance, you gotta be understanding here, ok?"

"Ok, we'll just put her in the back-"

"Did you just say 'put her in the back'?" Sam interrupts him, disbelief in his voice. Miles instantly tries to think of an excuse. "I called shotgun!" But Sam won't have it. He turns around, getting into the car as he says, "Miles, I'm _not_ putting her in the back; you gotta get out of my car right now." Yes! Thank you!

"That's party foul!" Miles complains.

"What rues?"

"Uh, bros before hoes!"

"Miles, I'm begging you to get out of my car," Sam says, making a praying gesture with his hands, leaving Miles shocked more than ever.

"You can't do this to me!" Well, looks like their friendship only goes so far when a girl is involved.

"I need you to get out of my car right now." Miles looks at Sam, his mouth hanging open in shock, but he does as asked, climbing out of the car and closing the car. We leave him dumbfound and drive after Mikaela, the music still playing. I smile at that, finding it cute.

"Mikaela!" Sam shouts, pulling up next to her. "It's Sam… Witwicky? I hope I didn't get you stranded or anything!" He drives at a steady pace, keeping up with his crush. He's had a crush on her for forever. The girl in question, though, doesn't even turn her head to look at him; her eyes looked on the road in front of her, an angry and thoughtful expression on her face.

"So listen, I was wondering if I could ride you home- I-I mean give you a ride home." Mikaela stops, considering what Sam just said. "In my car, to your house." She reaches for the door handle, and Sam opens the door for her to get in, and we drive away.

We ride in awkward silence for a few minutes, Mikaela staring out the window, while I lay on my back, one leg on the seat, and the other on the floor, being bored.

"I can't believe I' here right now," I hear Mikaela mutter. I raise my eyebrows. Well, nice of you to appreciate what Sam does for you. Sam turns for a second, giving me a hurts glance. "You can duck down if you want; it won't hurt my feelings." But the disappointed and saddened note in his voice on the last word says otherwise.

"Uh? No, no, no; I didn't mean… I didn't mean here with you, I just mean here like… in this situation." Oh, well, that's better that my first thought. No wonder people always tell you to not jump to conclusions. "It's that same situation that I'm always in because I hues I just have a weakness for hot guys, f-for tight abs and big arms," Mikaela says, and something in her voice tells me she's testing something. From the back, in the side mirror – or whatever the rear view mirrors on the sides are called – I see the ever to tiny smirk on her lips.

That little brat.

My mouth opens in a shocked smile, eyebrows raised. But as soon as she saw me in the mirror, she covered it with a brushing off, 'what ever' smirk.

I bury my face in my hands as Sam shows off his 'big arms' and something tells me it's only human courtesy that keep both Mikaela and I alike, from laughing. Poor kid; he's trying so hard. The two of them go into an exchange from which I cringe – especially when Mikaela asks if Sam is new to school. Ya, ouch. But then things just get weird:

The car starts making sputtering noises that even I can recognize as not a very good sign. This forces Sam to drive off the highway – quite the distance, at that – as a song I don't know plays on the radio. Ya, the radio is messed up big time. Sam ends up parking the car at a cliff, overlooking hills and valleys.

The scenery perks my interest and I all but lean out between the two front seats, looking out into the valley. Sam tries to come up with an excuse, claiming that it isn't his fault as Mikaela pins her hair back out of her face. He babbles on and on, until she cuts him off. "Just pop the hood," She states, getting out of the car. I lean over to Sam, whispering, "Sam, she gets the point, you don't need to say it over and over." He gives me a desperate look, showing me that he's nervous, and I brush it off, returning his look with one of my own telling him to just not do anything too rash and everything will be fine.

He gets out of the car, where Mikaela is already working her magic, trying to find the problem and fix it if possible. It should be easy – which it is – except for that she never finishes the job, because Sam asks that one thing that was the biggest mistake he ever made. She was trying to fix, all the while telling him, "oh you know, I don't really broadcast it; guys don't like it when you know more about cars than they do. Especially not Trent; he hates it.

"Well… if Trent is such a jerk, why do you hand out with him?" Oh no you didn't. Sam, why did you ask that?!

Mikaela is silence for a little while, and I can see the end of any chance he had with her as she says, "you know what? I'm just gonna walk." Oh God.

I bury my face in my hands as Mikaela gets her bag and walks away. Oh my God; I can't believe that just happened. This is bad; this is very, very bad.

Sam freaks out, begging the car to start and the car flares to life, music blasting. Yes! I throw my arms up into the air, into to have them painfully hit the roof, causing me to cringe and rub my hurting knuckles.

_"Baby come back!"_ the music screams, at which I burst out laughing. Yes! Thank you, thank you, thank you! "Hey!" Sam screams, closing the hood, and the passenger door before getting into the driver's seat, and turning around. "Hey!" Mikaela turns around, and I catch a glimpse of an amused smile on her face. "Wait a second!"

Sam stops for Mikaela and she gets in, and we drive away, to her place. After a little while – and yesterday, given that I sat, writing another chapter until three in the morning – finally catches up with me and I barely have time to react before I fall onto the seat, eyes closed.

**AN: I hope you liked the chapter. The two songs I used are "It's My Life" by Bon Jovi and "My Life Would Suck Without You" by Kelly Clarkson. And I know that the second one doesn't come out until 2009, but can we please pretend that it does, because it matched the scene perfectly.**

**Also, I would really like a beta for this story, so if you're interested, PM me please.**

**Remember to vote for the pairing you prefer (Sam or Optimus) and I will see you all next time.**


	3. Chapter 3

**AN: hello dear reader. Thank you all for your reviews. Here are the voting results so far:**

**Optimus: 3**

**Sam: 1**

**Reminder to continue to vote for a paring with your favorite character. This is your chance to steer the story in your preferred direction, so ****vote****!**

**Also, I'd like a beta for this story, so if you're interested, please let me know. I don't own Transformers, only my OC, who, by the way, looks like Nina Dobrev with curly hair; enjoy:**

The world around me slowly comes to focus, sounds spreading from a messy blur into words and sentences, the TV in the neighboring house speaking in a commercial tone, as my senses sharpen. I groan in irritation, shielding my vision from the sunlight, which wakes me every morning, streaming directly in my eyes from my window. Only I realize that there is no sunlight. In fact, even if it were, I wouldn't really be able to shade myself from it.

I crack my eyes open, finding myself to be myself lying in an acutely uncomfortable position, with my right arm bent behind me in a way I'm not sure it should be able to bend, and my right arm tucked painfully underneath it. I can't feel the fingers on either hand, or the hand itself at all, and the blanket is a tangled mess between my legs.

Wait… that's not my blanket. In fact, this isn't even my room.

The moment the realization hits, my eyes fly open and I struggle – and fail, obviously – to push myself up into a sitting position. It takes me a long moment to untangle my hands from underneath me, and when I finally succeed, I can't use them for the lack of sensation in them. They sting as though they are being pricked with a hundred needles. And ya, that usually does happen when your hands are asleep, but no matter how many times my hands went to sleep, I never really get used to it.

I finally manage to get up, rubbing sleep out of my blurry vision, and shake my head numerous times to clear it. That's when I realize fully that I'm not in my room, or in my _house_ for that matter; I'm in Sam's bedroom.

How that hell did I get here?

… Oh… right: I fell asleep in his car, and he doesn't know where I live. And he couldn't have just dumped me out some place.

I try to get out of bed, only to trip over the blanket, and fall forward, face-planting into the wooden floor, of the huge bedroom. It wasn't the first time I slept in his house. In fact, over the past two years, I sleep more here that actually at home. I'm practically renting the guest bedroom. However it _is_ the first time that I wake up so confused and take a nose dive straight into the floor.

With a loud, pained groan, I push myself off the floor, brushing off my clothes from yesterday. I need to get home. I glance at the clock, seeing that it's only six in the morning. My eyes widen in shock.

Who am I and what did I do to Raven? Usually, you'd need to blow a grenade up in my face to wake me up at around noon. What the hell happened to me?

With a shake of my head, I find my bag next to the bed, open the window, and climb out. Why didn't I use a door like a normal person, you may ask? Simple: because if I slept in Sam's bed, that he slept in the guest bedroom, which just so happens to be on the first floor, right next to his parent's room, unlike his room, which is on the top floor. The stairs creak like crazy, so set I one foot on them, the whole house will wake up. So I'd rather get out silently, than face the awkwardness of talking to Judy and Ron. Judy will no doubt embarrass both me and Sam. Last time I was in a similar situation, where I had no choice – because I really was in no condition to make one – but sleep in Sam's room for the night, Sam and I couldn't look at each other without blushing for two weeks straight.

So thanks, but no thanks; I think I'll pass.

I climb out onto the canopy in the back yard, and hop off, heading three streets over, to the road, where I pull out my phone and call a taxi. A seventeen year-old girl calling a taxi at six in the morning… Please don't let the cab driver be a curious and talkative person.

I only wait about fifteen minutes for the cab to come and I give him an address about five blocks off from my house. Thankfully, he isn't much of a talker and asks for nothing more, really, that the actual address, which suits us both just fine. I spend the ride to my destination in the quietness of my thoughts, trying to think up an excuse to stay home on Monday. I really don't want to go to school and- Oh my Lord! I forgot to pay the electric bill! Again! Oh god, this is the third time in a row!

Last time they called, they said I'd lose power if I didn't pay on time! But oh my god, I don't have a job! I was fired, but hey, at lease this time, it really wasn't my fault; the guy was asking for it. But I don't have a job, and my fridge is damn near empty. I have a tone of long-lasting food, like spaghetti and such, but it won't last forever, and unless I pay for water, I'll lose that, too. And I have to pay the landlord for the rent; otherwise he'll kick me out, just as he promised to do. And what about groceries?

Ok, Raven, take a deep breath.

I follow my own advice, taking a deep breath, and then letting it go, relaxing a little. Ok, let's sort out priorities. First thing first: the moment I get home, I'm getting on the computer and paying the electric bill. Second this second: I mail a check to the landlord before I lose my rent. Third thing third: the internet. Fourth: …

…

I do a quick round of mental math, drawing out the numbers in midair, and realize that I really can't do much of anything else without owning the bank… again. I'm either doing the groceries or paying for the water. The bill will come in two weeks, but I only get my paycheck in three weeks, so I need to ration out. And let's not forget the summer school bill. That's a good seven hundred dollars – since I already paid the first three.

The numbers aren't looking good at all. If God exists, he's definitely not on my side. With a loud, exhausted groan, I realize something I didn't want to realize. Oh Lord; just thinking it makes me tired. Looks like I'll have to put my fanfiction on hold and take another shift in addition to the ones I need to get back. Job hunt; today, it isn't an option. I'm not coming home until I have three jobs waiting for me.

Out of nowhere, I feel like crying. I don't know why; I just want to cry. Maybe I should just give up on the house and move into some small hotel. I can live there, and work there. Small little place with a diner. I can work in the kitchen and wait tables. And I can help out with the candy shop. It'll only be about five hundred dollars a month, which is half of what I pay now, and as embarrassing it might be to me if people found out that I live in a hotel, it's much better than this hellhole.

But if I wanted to get rid of the house, I'd have to do some major spring cleaning. I'd have to take a day or two off of school to do the cleaning, so it would look presentable. And I'd have to advertise it. Put it up on Kijiji and stuff. I'd have to get some people to look at it and give me an average cost, and then someone would actually have to be desperate enough to buy something in my neighborhood. And no one would ever take a seventeen year old girl seriously. If anything, they'll only contact the foster home about my sate of living, and then my life would certainly be over.

I can let the landlord do the renting or selling, but he would question my living conditions as much as others if not more. After all, I did talk to him on the phone, pretending to be my mom. He won't be too happy about that.

My bottom lip begins to quiver. I hate it; God I hate it. I hate it so much that I just want to kick the driver out of the cab, drive off to the middle of nowhere, and scream until I go mute. I want to beat my head against a brick wall until I knock myself unconscious. I can't take it anymore! I'm tired… no, I'm _exhausted_. I'm so spent and wasted and exhausted. I need a break. I'm so blasting tired of all of this! I just want it to end.

And I have no one but myself to blame for any of it.

.oOo.

With the bills paid, and my stomach filled with yet another bowl of cereal – my third on this morning – I take a quick shower and blow-dry my hair and change into something more presentable, getting into a plain beige tank top and grayish-brownish jeans and Converse shoes – I love Converse shoes. I grab my bag with urgent necessities like my phone, my wallet, a water bottle, and a few other things and grab my rollerblades before Hulk-smashing the door open, and doing to very same to shut it. I'd get it replaced if I knew how to do it. But sadly, I don't, so I'm stuck with a bad front door.

I always had this huge fear of that if someone were to break into my house through like a window or something, I wouldn't be able to make a quick run for it, because the door will be jammed, and I'll end up being like… I don't know; my imagination takes me to some pretty strange places. But I'm seriously paranoid of people with guns. I hate guns.

So with that, I headed to a far away bus station and waited for a bus that will take me to Sam's block, my skates slung over my shoulder. I went the whole bus ride, standing in the back, holding on to one of the poles for balance as at this point it was already eleven in the morning, and the bus – a bit surprisingly, seeing as it was Saturday – was already packed. I didn't mind, though, since I rarely sat on busses unless necessary. I really didn't like them, and tended to get carsick, so I either sat at the front – which wasn't really an option, at the moment – or stood.

The bus jerked to a stop, me jerking forward with it, and the PA system notified me that I was at my destination. I pushed past a few people, getting out the back door, and walked the next five minutes to Sam's house, where Ron and Judy are getting into their car.

"Hey, Raven!" Ron shouted to me, and I saluted him, all the while waving awkwardly and uncoordinatedly to Judy. Since both hands were in the air, I had to press the laces of the skates between my chin and left shoulder to keep them from falling, and grabbed them the moment I could.

"Hey there; going somewhere?" I asked, coming up to the car.

"Ya, we're just going out to get some shopping done. So, you came to give Sam heck?"" Judy chirps in that high-pitch voice of hers. I frown at her.

"Give him heck? Why would I? Did he do something? He did something to something of mine, didn't he?" They both exchange a look.

"He didn't tell you? I thought he'd tell you, seeing as you two are so close. Well in that case, it isn't my story to tell. What I _will_ tell you, though, is that he's grounded, so while you're here, make sure he doesn't use his phone of computer," Judy tells me, only confusing ne further.

"Uh… sure thing… I'll uh… have a nice shopping trip?" I say with great uncertainty and confusion, dragging the words out in slow motion. Sam's grounded? What did he do?" They pull out of the lot, and I watch their green car disappear down the street before going inside, where Sam was in the kitchen, making breakfast.

"Sam? What happened? I'm usually the one who doesn't get up till noon? What are you doing up so late? Oh and while you're at it, tell me what you did to get yourself grounded," I tell him, putting the skates down by the door, and walking over to make myself comfortable on the kitchen counter and Sam found a box of oatmeal.

"Well, last night my car was stolen, so I followed it; turns out it stole itself and was actually some sort of… robot… thing, and then the police came and I was arrested so I spent all night at the station and only got to bed six hours ago so ya…" Sam tells me in a sleepy, confused tone, and I bite my lip to keep from laughing before I realize what he just said.

"Wait… did you just say you were arrested?" I ask him, above and beyond confused as to how a boy like Sam could have been arrested. "Can you tell me from the start what happened?"

"Well, you fell asleep in my car so my dad and I had to carry you to my room. So I went to sleep, but then I woke up when I heard someone steeling my car-"

"-What?!" I cut him off, turning around to look in the driveway, realizing just now that his car was gone. "What? Who would steal your car?" I protest in shock.

"Just listen, ok? So I got up and followed it to the old junkyard a little out of town, ya? So there – and please don't laugh at this; I had enough of that cop as it is – the car stood up. It just stood up!" he shouts, throwing his hands in the air. "It just unfolded from a wrecked old car into this twenty-foot-tall robot thing! I called the police and when they came, of course, by my luck, the robot folded back into a car and when they came, they thought that I was the thief! So they arrested me." I do nothing but stare at him, wide-eyed, for a long moment.

"You car… stood up…?' I say slowly, giving him a peculiar look.

"See?! See what I mean? Even you think I'm crazy! It's nice to be loved," Sam huffs, and I hold back a chuckle.

"Sam, you know I can always tell when you're lying," I say. Actually, I can tell when anyone is lying. Call it a sixth sense or whatever. I just call it luck, but I can tell when anyone is lying. I don't know how, I just know that somethin is a lie. And before you ask, no, it isn't some superpower; it runs in the family, going back to my great – times five – grandmother to my mom's side. "And either you really believe in what you are telling me right now or…" And that's all I can say, because I can tell that he isn't lying. And the only reasonable explanation I can come up with is that… well, something doesn't have to actually be true to be genuinely believed in. He believes that it's what he saw, but it doesn't necessarily mean that it happened.

But of course, I can't say that without proving it to him that I don't really believe that his car stole itself and stood up into a giant robot. Cars don't stand up into robots; it isn't really possible… well, not yet, at least. I don't know how this robot that Sam speaks of look like, but if, according to Sam, he used to be a car… I think it's safe to assume that he's pretty darn big, being twenty feet tall. Technology is just not advanced enough to make something like that; therefore, I just don't think that it's physically possible that he actually saw a car-robot shapeshifter thing.

"Look I just… I don't know… technology is not nearly advanced enough for that. And I really don't want to say you imagined it, because I'm sure you had enough of that, but it just logically isn't possible. Maybe something like that would be possible in a century to a century and a half, but not just yet."

"Nice to see you support me," Sam grumbled angrily. With a defeated sigh, I hop off the counter, walking up to him and wrapping my arms around his chest.

"Hey... if anything, maybe you saw a brand new science experiment that they were testing," I say, going up on my tippy-toes to rest my chin on his shoulder. I really didn't want to make him feel stupid; he wasn't. "Maybe it was just some prototype that was being tested out for several decades from now. They were running tests or something-or-other," I say, trying to sound convincing.

"Oh, ya, and the experiment just so happened to decide to run away and hid from 'them' and pretend to be my car," Sam says sarcastically, pushing me away. It stings… like, _a lot_, and I bite my lip, trying to think of something., and trying even harder to not show that his action really hurt me.

"Look, I didn't see anything, thus I can't make any conclusions. Had I seen it, I would be able to make better judgment," I offer in a soft tone.

"Ya, I kinda doubt that," Sam snorts, getting the milk from the fridge. I turn around, and find the remote for the TV on the island, turning the TV off, the noise in the background annoying me.

"How do you people watch this stuff?" I ask in disbelief. I hate the news – always have. That, if you ask me, is rather ironic, actually. The news never shows anything good. It's always wars and natural disasters and economy and stuff. It's meant to scare you, always telling you that you aren't safe and that people are out there, trying to hurt other people, you including. It's all just so dark and negative. If I watch the news, my mood goes down the drain for a week. I just can't stand the stuff.

"Hey Sam, you want me to walk Mojo?" I ask, changing the subject.

"Sure, help yourself," Sam mutters, still frustrated. Maybe if I give Mojo a walk, Sam will forgive me… although I think I'll have to work a little harder than that to earn forgiveness this time. I did, after all, as good as have said that he was hallucinating. I walk to the door, taking my shoes off and put them away into the closet, before putting on my rollerblades, and get Mojo's leash from off a hook next to the front door, just as the dog in question begins to back.

I've never liked small dogs. They all have some sort of size complex that they try to make up for in volume, constantly barking really loudly. They're all just too annoying to me, so I try to stay away. I guess walking Mojo is my way of saying how sorry I am for something; so if anyone ever sees me walking Mojo, they immediately know that Sam was angry with me, and for a good reason, too.

"Mojo, it's too early for that," Sam complains, getting his little brown-gold dog off the kitchen counter, only to freeze. That just about when I hear a car engine outside. Frowning, I skate over next to Sam, looking out the half-open window to see… Sam's car? But his car was stolen. And wait… back up… I'm not expert – oh no, far from that – but car's don't drive on their own. So where is the driver? Cars don't drive on their own; they need people to drive them. SO where is that person?

"Sam, is it just me or-" But I don't get to finish the sentence. Sam yanks me back, away from the window, and I struggle to catch me balance, but fail, landing on hands and knees on the floor. Sam grabs Mojo, hiding behind a wall, his off-limits mobile in hand, frantically dialing, and waving me over to hide with him at the same time.

I give him a confused look, but do as he motions, getting to my feet and brushing myself off before skating over to him as he, in panic, tells Miles that his self-stolen – aka, apparently, 'Satan's Camaro' – is stalking him. Apparently the said teen hangs up on Sam, because he gets an annoyed look on his face before shoving Mojo into my hands, and tossing his phone onto the counter.

"Stay here!" Sam whisper-shouts to me. He grabs a set of keys from one of the shelves, and runs outside using the backdoor. I grumble in confusion, peering outside to see Sam unlock his mom's pink, and running away. And then I watch in great worry as his 'Satan's Camaro' drives right after him.

Despite of that nothing in this whole situation made sense, I dropped the annoying dog – who was still barking – on the floor, grabbed my bag and slung it over my shoulder before struggling to get out of the house. I got outside, seeing the car – which, if I saw right, was driving _on its own_ – was following a panicking Sam on the sidewalk. I didn't really even think about anything before pushing off the cement after Sam. The car was chasing him over the sidewalk, but once Sam took the first turn, it turned to the road, following him as a proper car would. Somehow, it made the whole scene more acceptable. Sam was still being chased, but at least the car was chasing him normally.

Did I really just think that?

I lost sight of Sam for a little while, in the thick crowd; so instead, I just followed the car. I came to an abrupt halt, skidding a little across the ground, only a mare foot away from a fallen over Sam, lying on the ground in pain.

"Sam?" I heard a familiar voice asked and I looked up to See Mikaela, Maggie, Jessica, and Ally all at a table, the last three laughing. Mikaela looks very confused, and struggling to not laugh. Ya, not to be a jackass, but some kid on his mom's pink bike falls over in front of me like that… I'd be laughing, too. "That was uh…" She trails off a little, trying to come up with the words. "That was really… awesome."

Sam groans in pain. "It _felt_ awesome." I kneel down, helping him out and when he sees me, he rolls his eyes. "Are you alright?" I ask, even though I know it's one hell of a stupid question.

"No, I'm not ok; I'm getting chased by my car right now," he groans, "I gotta go-ahhh." I wince as I help him up and he gets his mom's bike. He climbs on and painfully peddles away. I exchange a quick and worried glance with Mikaela.

"Maybe we should…" I start. I really didn't care if she was following him, but she did look worried, so I figured she'd want to help. I knew I was going after him whether anyone came with me or not. Mikaela gives a quick nod, getting up and handing her bag over her shoulder. "You know what, I'm gonna catch up with you later," She says. She heads to her scooter, putting on her helmet as she gets on. "Well?" She asks, looking back at me, "are you getting on?"

I don't hesitate to – with struggle to keep my balance – climb on to the back of her scooter and hold on for dear life as she starts driving. I never really trusted any vehicle that had less than three wheels. I close my eyes tightly, saying a little prayer about not letting the bike fall when Mikaela first jerks to a stop, almost being run over by a cop car, and then again when she took a sharp turn.

We drive after Sam and it only takes me a few seconds to realize that the cop car was driving in Sam's direction. I really hoped that it wasn't actually following him. Then again, I never really believed in coincidence.

The route the police courser took leads us to a construction site – not that there was any actually construction going on. Same with roadwork; I mean, why do they call them 'roadworks' when there is never any work going on?! Mikaela slows down as she enters the construction site, driving around for a little, both of us calling out Sam's name.

"The boy in question comes running out of nowhere, waving his arms around and screaming insanely. "GET BACK!" Sam screams to us, making a 'turn around and leave!' motion with his arms. Quite frankly, I'd never seen him run this fast _ever_ in my _life_. "GO!"

Mikaela doesn't slow down, still driving in his direction, and the next thing I know, my back and tailbone simultaneously hit the ground, Mikaela falling on top of me, sandwiching me between her and the ground. All air is very painfully knocked out of me. I take a moment to remember how to breathe, shoving Mikaela almost _violently_ off of me and curling myself up into a ball in the ground. I gasp for air, ever gasp sending electrical pain through me.

"What the… hell… Sam…?" I grunt in pain just as Mikaela says, "what is your _problem_ Sam," putting an emphasis on the word 'problem'. She shrugs off her helmet, looking down at my balled up, pained form in concern.

"Ok there is a monster there who's just attacking me!" Sam shouts panic, frantically motioning to the left. I struggle to straighten out, groaning as another round of electric-like pain – and yes, I speak from experience here – shoots through my midsection. I turn my head in the direction he's pointing and freeze in utter shock.

What I see hulk-stomping its way to us is what Sam rightfully described to be a monster.

**I hope you liked the chapter. If you have any questions, please ask away, and I will gladly answer them – without giving any part of the plot away, of course. Also, when she's talking about being able to tell when people are lying: ya, no, it isn't some superhuman superpower. It's just something that she can do – like Steve from Warehouse 13 – it isn't anything supper important.**

**"Vote! The vote is still on!**

**First option: this is an Optimus/OC story**

**Second option: this is a Sam/OC story – a pairing you don't see very often. This is your chance to get the pairing you best prefer, so vote! And if you want, tell me why you prefer the pairing.**

**See you next time and have a great day/night!**


	4. Chapter 4

**AN: here is another chapter for you, my dear readers.**

**Here are the voting results so far:**

**Sam: 6**

**Optimus: 6**

**This is your last chance to vote, so vote! Next chapter there will not be any more voting, but I will still love to hear what you think. If the voting will end up in a tie, I'll most likely do a Sam/OC, but Optimus will still be a large part of Raven's life. I ****_might_**** do a love triangle, but I'm using 'might' very loosely. I don't like unrequited love; it's really sad, and you can never satisfy everyone, and someone always ends up heartbroken – readers and characters alike.**

**So vote, vote, vote, because this is your last chance!**

**I don't own Transformers; enjoy the chapter!**

It wasn't real; it couldn't be real because it was logically impossible. It was too Sci-Fi, too farfetched to be real. It wasn't something that could actually happen just like that. I was bound to be seeing stuff. And it would have been a good excuse if Sam wasn't screaming his head off about it.

I know nothing about medicine or the human brain, but collective hallucinations – or whatever it's called – don't usually happen; especially for no reason. So even though I know next to nothing about how human minds work – other than the fact that the human race, as a group, is pretty dumb in many aspects – I'm going to take a guess and say that I'm not seeing things. Sam sees it, too – and is freaking out about it – and so does Mikaela, so I can't really say that the monster isn't real.

It's real, alright, and it's furiously running right at us.

It isn't real; it's all just a bad dream. It's a nightmare, and I'm in that cab I called, and I'm sleeping. I'm just having a very realistic nightmare.

I feel an arm pulling me and it brings me back to reality. Instantly, my denial turns into outright terror. My jaw hits the ground in utter shock as I try to remember how to move and breathe again. "Get up!" Sam shouts at both me and Mikaela, pointing away from the monster to support his point. "You have to run!"

And just as Sam says that, I hear tires screeching. I don't get time to look when we all fall to the side, out of a speeding car's way. To my shock, the car is Sam's, and it drives right past us, tires screaming against the ground as it turns sharply, slamming into the approaching monster. The monster falls to the ground from the impact, making a mechanic noise of anger as the – if I remember correctly – Camaro pulls up next to us, door open and waiting.

Something about the car is just _screaming_ 'get inside, now!'. I look at it, eyes wide, fear making my heart race. I try to think of something specific, but I can't focus on anything but that fact that there is a monster chasing us, and that Sam's car just came out of nowhere with no driver. I can't even make a proper sentence in my head.

And yet somehow I manage to get out, "Sam, What is this?" My voice shakes with fear and panic, alas does the rest of me.

"You have to get in the car," Sam urges quickly, his voice just as instable as mine. I try to move away, but can't seem to coordinate my intention with my action because instead of shoving against Sam and falling backwards, I fall right at him. He catches me, holding me steady in my incoherent state. "Y-get in the car," he tells me again, but I only panic more, weakly – and more than uselessly – trying to free myself of his grasp, as if I'm half in sleep.

"Trust me." I just shake my head, not fully comprehending what he's saying. I don't want to get in the car. I don't want to get in there and go anywhere. I just want to wake up in the cab, the driver shouting to me to get up for the last five minutes. I wasn't to get out of the cab and go home and pay the bills and tell myself again and again that I need to clean up and as always, come down with the ultimate response: I'm do it tomorrow.

"Trust me!" I hear Sam shout and for a second, I look at him. Trust him? _Trust_ him? I trusted him already. I trusted him more than I trusted _myself_. I believe him, no matter what he said. I trusted him so much that sometimes it scared me. And it scared me even more now. It scared me because despite the fact that every cell in my body told me to get up, and run for my life while I still had the chance, and despite that I was beyond terrified to get in a car that drove on its own, I let Sam drag me into it, tugging on my arms painfully as he did so.

Somehow, I ended up sandwiched between him and Mikaela, as the car moved again, driving away from where the monster laid. I look back behind up to see the monster roll onto its knees and spring forward, something I can't hope to explain happening at that very moment:

The monster jumps into the air, folding in on itself, and becoming the police cruiser from earlier. I'm not joking or over exaggerating: it leaped forward and folded into a cop car before it hit the ground again.

"We're gonna die, we're gonna die, we're gonna die, we're gonna die, we're gonna die, we're gonna die!" Mikaela and I scream in synch, holding onto each other for dear life as the car speeds through the city, away from the construction site. I knew the city better than the back on my own hand, yet I had no clue whatsoever where we were going. We scream for dear life as Sam tries to assure us that the car is a 'kickass' driver. It does nothing to calm us down, though, and we only cling to each other tighter as the car takes yet another sharp turn, driving at an insane speed, more than twice the speed limit, the monster cop car chasing us equally fast.

A new fear comes up among the rest: what if we crash? We're driving so fast, and the car is driving on its own – which technically shouldn't be possible, yet it, somehow, is – so what if we crash? Ok well, we die if we crash, of course. I don't want to die. Oh my god, I don't want to die!

"I don't want to die! I want to live and finish school and-and-and uh meet a nice guy! I don't want to die. Please just let me live, just let me live just let me live!" I scream hysterically, as Mikaela screams something very similar. The car only speeds up, and the two of us huddle in horror and I pull Sam into the group hug.

"I take it back, we're gonna die!" Sam screams as we crash through a colored window of some old and empty warehouse. I can't die, I still have to see the second season of my new TV obsession: Doctor Who; I can't die, not before I see what happens now that he looks different!

I want to live; just let me live! I promise to be good!

We crash through some old boxes, spiraling around the building and back out onto the street. We hand on to each other, my eyes shut as tightly as possible. We scream in a choir as the chase continues. We drive across the other side of the population-fifteen-thousand town and back around. We must have driven through every street and alley, at one point passing my own house as we did. We drove like hell itself was chasing us for several hours.

After a while, the screaming stopped and we simply clung to each other like we won't get the chance again, which was probably a correct assumption. It became dark outside by the time we finally slowed down, driving into an area full of warehouses.

We drive backwards towards one before the car shuts down entirely. The panic, which I had become used to, strengthens as the doors lock and the two people on either side of me try to unlock them, but to no avail. I begin to shake again, barely breathing.

"We're locked in," Sam says, stating the obvious, but this time, I don't nag him about it. He tries to turn the car on, but it won't make a sound, causing him to hit the steering wheel in anger and frustration and fear. "The car won't start; at least we ditched the monster, right?" Mikaela shrinks back into her seat and I follow her vision, biting my lip so hard that it isn't long before I taste blood.

I find Sam's hand, holding on to it tightly, and lean into him. Outside, the monster in the cop-car version of itself, drives by us. In the bone-chilling terror, tears blur my vision and I hold my breath. Please don't stop; please drive by us and leave and let us live because we didn't do anything wrong and we want to live. Please leave so we never have to see you again.

But my prayers go unheard when the cop car stops, lights blinking; blue, red, blue, red… I never want to see blue and red flashing lights again, ever in my life.

The car makes a starting-up noise once. Twice. And finally, it revs to life, driving forwards. We're all pressed backwards into the seats, thanks to those confusing motion laws as it drives right past the cop car and turns sharply, the passenger door opening. We are dumped, laterally _dumped_ out of the car and onto the ground in a pile.

I hit the ground – and poor Sam – painfully, feeling my knees and the balls of my hands sting as they drag across the ground. I hiss in pain and try to get up, off of my friend, only to be pushed down by Mikaela. She rolls off and I turn around, finding Sam's car beginning to shift.

The three of us watch in utter disbelief as the car in question begins to transform, pars sliding out, more parts taking their place, gears shifting and making noises; separating and rearranging themselves, sliding into place with a small hissing sound. And in what seemed like forever, yet at the same time no time at all, the car is gone, in its place a giant robot, twenty feel tall. Car… robot… twenty feet… Oh my God… Sam wasn't kidding: his car really is a giant robot. But how is that possible? It's just as impossible and just as unreal as the monster. And yet they are both very real.

The robot's hands curl into fists, up in front of him in a fighting stance. We stumble back as the robot takes a tiny for him, yet big for us, step back. On my rollerblades, I try to stand, but instantly fall on my ass, so instead, I crawl backwards, away from the new monster.

Sam and Mikaela scramble up, and then they drag me up, helping my instable self stand up straight. On wheels, standing is a lot harder that it should be and since standing, in this situation, is unreal for me, I fall right back down as soon as Mikaela lets go of me. I fall down, Sam crashing down after me. He manages to catch himself and pulls me back up.

The police car speeds right at us, transforming back into its monster self, and launches at Sam's car-monster. I scream as Sam helps me back away. I try to maintain my balance, but fail and Sam ends up, once more, dragging me. I watch, my mouth hanging wide open, as the two monsters fly overhead, crashing into the ground and sparks fly as the metal giants skid across the ground. We all shriek in terror.

The cop-monster shoves the Camaro - monster away violently, sending him flying, and I watch in terror as pulls a huge ball covered in spikes, each approximately my own size, and it begins spinning like a blender. I shriek, clinging to the two people next to me for dear life – and balance – in fear. Oh dear lord, how is this even possible? How is it possible for this to be real? It's not logically possible. Like I said before: technology isn't advanced enough for this. And even if someone did manage to build something like this, they'd long since be bragging to the world about it.

We stagger back, me fighting to keep my footing, in shock, our mouths hanging open in disbelief. I close my eyes, wishing myself away from this nightmare that feels so very real. Everything feels so real: the fear, the shaking, and the confusion; it all feels as real as anything. And when I open them, I find that, despite how much I wanted to wake up, I wasn't sleeping. This was real; I was really witnessing two huge killing-machines having a death-match.

We try to crawl away as a plate on the cop-monsters chest slides open, releasing a much smaller – but not any less scary – monster; about three feet tall, and spiky. It makes some strange noises that I'd always imagined computers would make if they were able to talk, before charging at us. We get up as fast as we can, and run – or in my case, skate – away as fast as possible. It's a good thing there I know a skating park not too far from my house, and go there on a weekly basis, so even though I'm on wheels, getting away is not a problem whatsoever.

Behind us, I hear one of the monsters make some sort of noise that resembled talking… only in a different language. The three of us stagger to a stop, getting out of the way as the Camaro monster is tossed violently – and seemingly painfully – into one of the giant containers standing around. Sparks fly everywhere as metal screeches against metal, and I cover my ears against the sound, that reminded me too much of the nasty sound of nails on a chock board. I wince at the horrible sound, pushing myself after Sam and Mikaela, getting as far away from the fighting as we can, as fast as we can. But when we come to an area completely covered in ricks, my skating comes to a stop, and I quickly have to learn to run in skates.

I try convincing myself that it's just like running in heels, but it doesn't help much, given that I've never been in heels, and have no wanting whatsoever to try a pair on. I run after Mikaela, tying not to break an ankle – which proves to be a difficult task after I twist both after a few steps, and end up limping.

I reach a hand behind me, to Sam, who brags it, but a second later, the hold on my hand is gone, and Sam is screaming. I stop – falling over as I do – and turn around to See Sam being attacked by the small, but terrifying monster. "AHHH! It's got me, it's got me!" Sam shouts as the little monster claws at him. Sam tries crawl away, but the monster catches his feet, pulling him right back to where he was. The little sucker grabs on to Sam's pants, and Sam tries to get out of them, but the tiny little basted won't let him make a move.

I don't even think about it before half crawl, and half stagger at the monster, knocking it to the ground and wrap my arms around it, trying to keep it still long enough for Sam to get away. "Get off of him, you little creep! Don't touch Sam!" I shout at it, trying to hold on to it like an owner trying to hold on to a fighting do, who won't stay still for a second, keeping the owner from putting a leash on it. But the little monster is too spiky, and it isn't at all long before I let go, instantly examine my arms, finding them covered in red lines. I'm not bleeding, and I am scratched, and those are the types of scratched that itch like crazy in an hour or two. So knowing my lack of self control, I'll scratch them to the point of bleeding before tomorrow morning.

I get up, Sam and the monster already gone, one running after the other ahead of me, and limp after them, only to be knocked to the ground by Mikaela seconds later. My eyes widen at what is in her hands. "Uh… where did you get a power-saw?" I ask, not sure if I called it the right name. Mikaela points behind herself at a shed before getting up, and offering me a hand. I take it, pulling myself up. "Thanks," I say breathlessly, and the dark-haired girl gives a quick nod.

"Come on, let's go," she urges, helping me stand upright. I limp after her, grunting over every step, and she runs on, down a hill, towards where Sam ran just a few moments ago. Hearing Sam's scream, I stop, turning a little to the left, to where the sound came from, and run to him, trying to ignore the aching in both my ankles. I come up to the edge of a hill, seeing the little monster assaulting Sam, and Mikaela running up to the both of them with her newfound weapon ready to be used.

"Get away from Sam, you little freak! Don't you dare hurt him!" I scream and, without thinking twice about it, start getting gown, only to slip. I tumble end over end, all the way down to the bottom. I use the fence to get up, seeing that I rolled to the bottom before Mikaela made it here, and, realizing what she had in mind, started tugging on the little monster, trying to get it off of him. "Get off!" I scream at it as if it would understand me, and pull until the bugger lets go. I body-slam it into the ground as hard as I could and Mikaela, already next to us, swings the saw at him, cutting hi up. The thing makes nasty 'dying animal' noises that I know will haunt me in my sleep. I cover my ears, partially blocking out the screech of pain that sends a shudder through me.

Mikaela slings the saw over her shoulder, breathing heavily, and I give her a nod of thanks, even though she did nothing for me; she helped Sam, and in my mind, it's enough for me to thank her. "Serves you right," I spit at the little thing, all in pieces. The head – I think I'm going to vomit at this – tries crawling away, pulling itself with needle-like things around its mouth. I find Sam's hand, holding it tightly, my eyes wide. The thing is all cut up, and the head is trying to crawl away. Yup, my breakfast is coming up, and out.

"Not do tough without a head, are you?" Sam says to it, taking a step towards it and kicking it like a soccer ball; quite an impressive distance, too. I raise my eyebrows at Sam, giving him a 'wow' look. "You ok?" He asks, and I give a small nod and smile.

"Ya; I'm a little sore, and tomorrow is gonna be a nightmare, but I'm good. Did he hurt you? Are you alright?" I ask him, automatically looking over Sam for injuries.

"Ya, no I'm good, Come on, let's go," He tells us, bending down a little and getting my right arm over his shoulder. "Here, lean on me; you don't look like you can walk on your own right now." I smile, leaning some of my weight on him, and he helps me limp away from the pile of shred metal that used to be a tiny killer with four eyes. We make our way down the ditch to a part that isn't quite as steep, but freeze when up above, the Camaro monster walks in our direction, closer to the edge of the hill, a canon folding away into its arm. I hold me breath, holding on to Sam, and we all inch towards it, staying at the bottom, while it stands at the top.

I feel Sam breath heavily, shaking a little from the episode with the little monster. I struggle to keep from shaking myself, but to no alive. I feel breathing become painful, and realize that combining the running and panicking, and the dust all around us, my asthma is playing up. And a horrifying thought strikes: the last time my asthma made an appearance was over a year ago, so I never took my inhalator anywhere anymore; it was at home.

I try to take slow, shallow breaths, hiding my face between my arms, to breathe in as little dust as possible, and try to keep the wheezing away. I take carefully breath, not only because of the asthma, but also because… ok, I'm not gonna lie: I'm scared as hell. There is a giant, twenty-foot-tall robot death-machine that was just fighting another robot death-machine, and this one won. So considering the competition, I really don't want to be on its bad side.

"What…" I manage to get out in a shaking whisper from behind Sam, "what is it?"

"It's a robot…" Sam says numbly. "… Like a… like a different… a supper advanced robot…" No, it can't be. Earth might be advanced, but we aren't nearly advanced enough. And yet, I am looking at walking proof of the opposite. What if… no, I refuse to consider the alternative. We humans might be petty and tiny and far too pathetic to be alone, but this is just too big a stretch. There is no way that it's what I think it is; it's can't be. "It's probably Japanese," Sam says, tilting his head towards ma a little. "Ya, it's defiantly Japanese."

"Sam… I don't really think it can be Japanese," I say slowly and ever so quietly. Sam turns to face me, giving me a questioning look. "Well, if it were Japanese, I think they'd be bragging to the world about that, "I explain. Sam raises his eyebrows, as if to say 'ya, probably', and turns back to the robot.

"But if it isn't Japanese, than whose?" He asks, making a good point; one which I don't want to argue, because my explanation is a little – more like a lot – farfetched. So instead I just shrug. The robot comes to a stop at the top of the hill, and Sam begins to move forward. I let go of him, letting him inch towards it, but he doesn't get a single step before I grab his arm, pulling him back.

"What are you doing?" I hiss at him, wanting to smack him in the head and tell him to not be stupid.

"I don't think he wants to hurt us," Sam mumbles, and I have to restrain myself from smacking him. "Really?" I hiss again, "Because it just beat the other robot's ass, so I wouldn't get too close if I had half a brain." Sam turns gives me a reassuring look, wordlessly telling me that it's ok. I loosen the grip on his arm and he moves forward. I hold on to his hand A little longer, only letting him go when he's out of reach. Sam, for the love of God, be careful; don't get too close to that thing.

I only notice that I was inching after him when I find myself right next to Sam again, his hand finding mine. "I think it wants something from me," Sam says, and I give him a questioning look.

"_What?_" I hear Mikaela hiss from behind us in confusion.

"Well because the other one was talking about my eBay page," Sam tells us, truing to look at me as he does so. I feel my expression mirror Mikaela's confusion. "_What?_" I hiss, echoing Mikaela. "Sam, you're the _strangest_ kid on the planet," I say, looking at him.

"Can you talk?" Sam shouts up to the monster who, in turn, looks down at him, whirling a little before the radio switches on. "_XM satellite radio…digital radio…broadcasting system_" and something else in between, which I didn't quite catch. Why did he radio us something? It takes me a few more seconds, and then I color red at my slowness and stupidity, just as Sam voices my thoughts. "So y-you talk through radio?"

"_Thanks to you, too; you're wonderful, you're wonderful,_" the radio speaks and the robot giant claps his hands, giving Sam a thumbs-up. I let out a shaky breath, eyes wide, mouth hanging open.

"So what was that last night? What was that?" Sam asks loudly.

_"Message from Star-fleet, Captain… through the inanimate vastness of space… angels will rain down like visitors from Heaven! Hallelujah!" _and a few other things I didn't get. Visitors from… "Visitors from heaven…" I hear Mikaela mutter, coming up next to me. "What… what are you like an alien or something?" she asks, echoing my thoughts. In reply, the Camaro - robot points a finger at her, as if to say 'exactly', and then bends down into a crouch. Before I know it, the twenty foot tall robot is gone, and in its place stood Sam's car, ordinary as anything; not a single thin out of place. It was a completely ordinary car.

My mouth swings open in shock, Sam hold on my hand tightening, half in protection, and half in reassurance. I tighten my hold of his hand, too, placing my free hand on his shoulder, and marveling at what just happened. Oh I can already hear Sam all smug about this. I'm not going to hear the end of it for a very long time. I can already hear all those semi-clever remarks about tonight that he's going to throw at me. I'd be lucky if he waits till tomorrow to start teasing me about this.

I close my eyes, knowing that whatever it is he has to say, I'll deserve it. After all, I did as good as tell him that I didn't believe that his car stood up into a twenty-foot-tall robot.

The passenger door swings open, the radio once again speaking. _"Any more questions you wanna ask?"_ Ha! Only about a million! I lace my fingers with Sam's as he says out loud what I'm thinking.

"He wants us to get in the car." I stare at the car, and then back at Sam, my mouth still open, my eyes just as wide as his. There is no way in hell that I'm getting into that thing. It's an alien from space; it's a space-robot car; it's alive and it can talk through the radio. If that's not disturbing enough, then I don't know what is.

But Sam hold on my hand reassures me, it tells me that everything is gonna be alright. So I ask the only thing my voice will allow. "And go where?" I put a slight emphasis on the 'where', my voice half-hysterical, and half-shocked. I'm scared; I'm so damn scared, I just want all of this to be a bad dream.

But then I look into Sam's eyes, and somehow, the look in them makes the fear disappear; the look in them makes everything disappear: the fear, the confusion, the distrust… everything. I gaze into his eyes, our fingers laced, and I find that I never felt safer. He make me feel safe, and ok, and for the first time tonight, I want all of this to be real, because for the first time tonight, I feel so safe; safe unlike ever before, and it's a feeling I love, and I want it to last forever.

_"_Fifty years from now when you're looking back at you life don't you want to be able to say you got in the car?" Sam asks. And that question made me realize something: yes, yeas I did. I wanted to look back at my plain life and say that something happened tonight; something fantastic, something amazing and completely out of the ordinary. Of all the time I wrote stories, all I ever wanted while writing them, was for my life to be just like them. I loved writing so much, because it took me to a whole other world, where everything was better. I could be anyone, and do anything. Taking risks like this, trying new things… that wasn't me. Well, at least not in front of anyone but Sam, to whom I found it to be so easy to open up to.

And I didn't want to be that anymore; I didn't want to be so insecure and indecisive. I knew that this is the part where I pry Sam's hand off me and run as fast as my feet can take me, but that wasn't me either. I never took risks, but I never backed down from something either. If something was interesting, I would bend over backwards to check it out.

I look into Sam's green eyes, seeing so much hope ain them, seeing them nearly begging me to come with him, and all my doubts seem to all but fade away, and disappear altogether. He was offering me the adventure of a lifetime, a hope for a better future than this. He was giving me the opportunity which only the three of us, out of six billion people, were getting. Yes, I wanted to say I got in that car with him. I wanted to say that I was brave enough to go with him, no matter where this car took us. I wanted to be with him through it, and share this with him. I wanted this to be ours.

So I smile at him, a small smile, but I know he can understand every one of the hundred words that it holds. I know he can understand how much I trust him, and how much I want us to share this together. I most of all, I know he understands how much it means to me that he's offering to share this with me; have me be a part of this with him. I know he understands how much it meant to me that he wants this to be ours, too.

I look to Mikaela, seeing the same wonder in her eyes as she looks at the Camaro, and she starts climbing the hill. Sam helps me up as well. I feel my phone buzz in my bag – which I find myself surprised at, given that I forgot about it entirely – but I ignore it, not caring who it could possibly be. I can check my missed calls tomorrow. Right now, it was just right here, and right now. I manage to climb in the car, the skates on my feet making it difficult, and my ankles are hurting like hell, but I ignore that, too.

All I care about at the moment, I sitting right here, in the Camaro, which is actually an alien from space, with Sam. Right here, right now, that's all that mattered to me. And it was perfect. I felt like I was in a teen drama, where a bunch of teenagers steel their parents' car and run away, as the can starts driving. It was reckless and stupid; we were sitting inside an alien robot, and we were just fine with it. If we were this dumb, it would be a miracle for any of us to live to age forty.

But right now, I didn't care about that. I wrap my arms around Sam, smiling to myself, as we drive away, inside an alien robot.

Sam wraps his arms around me, and we sit in each others embrace, driving away inside an alien robot. And I never felt safer.

**AN: so what do you say? Did you like it? Like I said before, vote, vote, vote, because this is the last chapter that you can; this chapter decides which way the story goes. Did you like the chapter? Please leave a thought or two about it, because I like complements *wink* and I like to hear what you think of my story.**

**Also, here is a question for you: who is your favorite transformer and why?**

**And with that, have a nice day or night, and I will see you all next time. Bye! *Waves*.**


	5. Chapter 5

**AN: hello dearest readers! Here I am with the fifth chapter. Like I said, last chapter was the last chapter to vote, and the results are: This is a Sam/OC. But don't worry! Optimus is going to be a large part of Raven's life, so you'll be seeing plenty of him.**

**This story will continue past the first movie, and if people like it enough, it will even go into the second movie. I'm hoping to make the majority of this story the two years in between, so we'll see. It's all up to you guys. I'll write more if you want to read more, so you guys ****_have_**** to tell me. I have a few other stories I'm working on, so you have to tell me if you will keep reading for me write more.**

**Also, I know most people skip AN's and get to the stories, but if I'm writing an Author's Note, please read it, because it's important.**

**If you have any questions at all, please ask, and I will gladly answer them. Other than that, I don't own transformers; enjoy.**

We make a one-second-long stop to pick up Sam's pants and Mikaela's bag before leaving the God-forsaken warehouse area, where Sam's space car fought the cop-monster. We all end up being crammed into the passenger seat and the space between it and the driver's because Mikaela – who should be sitting in the driver's seat – refuses to sit there.

Sam and I manage to make ourselves small enough to fit in the passenger seat. It really isn't anything too different, though – we've shared a single seat before, at the dinner table, or during a movie in class, when all the other chairs were being used as foot-rests – but it wasn't the most comfortable position ever… not that I could complain too much. Sharing a seat with Sam wasn't so bad; my arms was asleep, and I was getting a cramp in my leg and it hurt like hell, but I could do worse. I felt safe with Sam, no matter how uncomfortable it made me feel.

"So…" Sam starts, after we drive for a while, in silence, "something you were saying about technology not being advanced enough?" I give him a look, awkwardly punching him in the arm, only I end up hurting myself in the process. "Oh shut up! I meant _Earth_ technology! Do you seriously expect me to have known that your car was a space-robot?" I complain, defending my point. This is the part where I raise my hands in self defense, but I'm really in no position to do so. "Besides, it isn't like you knew that this guy – I still can't get my head around that this car of yours is from space – is an alien, so it doesn't even count."

"Fine by me…" Sam trails off.

"… But I still owe you an apology," I finish the sentence, even though I know that it isn't what he meant. He rarely ever expects me to apologies, and I never expect him to apologize either. If he does something wrong, he just makes up for it in a week or two… or three, or so on.

And even though I know he doesn't expect an apology from me, I still give him one, because I could as well have called him crazy, saying that he was seeing things that weren't there. "I'm sorry, Sam; I really am. I just…"

"Didn't believe me; it's alright, I get it. I didn't really believe me either, not until this morning. I mean, you were right: we just aren't technologically advanced enough for something like my car to exist. And no one could have know that he was from space," Sam tells me, and I smile up at him, trying to make myself more comfortable on the one seat that the two of us share.

"Hey, you wanna sit on my lap? It'd be more comfortable, and Mikaela would have more space to sit. And besides, I got a seat belt, but it won't stretch that far." I look at his quizzically, squinting. This sounds one lame excuse away from something he would tell Mikaela. But then again, he's making a valid point: we make a sharp turn or something, and the three of us are going to go flying out the windshield.

I think about it for a second, and then struggle to climb my way over, shoving Sam into the seat, and getting a grunt out of him in the process. I finally manage to somehow get more or less comfortable and Sam tries to get the seat belt around the two of us, I grab it, clicking it into place when he can't reach with only one hand.

"Mikaela, why don't you sit on the seat?" I ask, "Wouldn't it be a lot more comfortable?"

"I'm not sitting there; he's _driving_," she says, sounding half-panicking, and half-hostile – which is understandable, given that the car is an alien. Even I wouldn't feel too great about sitting in the driver's seat. I give her a sympathetic look. "Well, in that case, come here," I say, reaching my arms out to her, offering something that I guess can be called a hug. "Just in case that car jerks to a stop. I have a seat belt, so I might be able to keep you from flying out the window," I tell her, and after a moment, she takes the offer. I put my arm around her, acting as a more-or-less seat belt, in order to keep her in the seat in case something happens.

It feels all weird and crowded all of the sudden. It felt much better with just Sam and me, but then I realize just how selfish that sounds. So I just shrug it off, knowing that I wouldn't want to be sitting in the space between two seats, in a very uncomfortable position, and be at risk of going out the window if the car jerks, or of flying backwards if it speeds up. It's much safer this way.

"Thanks," she says absently, clearly somewhere deep inside her head more than here with us at the moment. "You know what I don't understand?" Mikaela starts after a moment of silence that I would enjoy if we weren't all crammed into one seat. "Why if he's supposed to be like this supper advanced robot does he transform back into this piece of crap Camaro?" She lowers her voice to barely a whisper at the end, as if she doesn't want the Camaro in question to hear what she says, but it's clear that the efforts are without result when the car screeches to a sudden stop, freezing crookedly in the middle of a tunnel.

We all jerk forward, Sam grunting in pain, and Mikaela holding on to my arm, and reaching for the dashboard to hold herself in place. My eyes widen in fear – mostly of not quite knowing what the car is gonna do to us now that Mikaela accidentally insulted it. I find Sam's arm, holding on to it tightly, like it might save me from whatever is gonna happen now that the car is angry or upset, or whatever it is that it feels right now.

The passenger door swings open, and we all instantly get the hint. I reach for the seat belt, unbuckling it, and struggle to climb over Sam, and out of the car. The two others are quick to follow, getting out of the car as fast as they can. I stare like it might explode. What the hell is going on? Did we just get kicked out of a car _by_ the car?

I stagger a little, catching my balance using Sam, as I remember that I'm in rollerblades, which aren't exactly the most comfortable footwear in the world. "Move it, you moron!" I hear someone shout to us as Mikaela gets out. We all stare at the car, dumbfound, as it turns around and drives away, closing the door after us. Did it just abandon us in the middle of a tunnel? Well… _someone's_ a big Diva. I press my lips in a tight line, my hands automatically going to my hair as they usually do when I'm a cross between confused and stressed.

"Fantastic," Sam says in frustration, staring after his runaway car, "now you pissed him off," he shouts over the noise in the tunnel, to Mikaela. I turn to give her an annoyed look, which she returns with one of guilt, crossing her arms and caving her shoulders in, like she's trying to hide.

"That car is sensitive. 'Mean four thousand dollars just _drove off_." I place a hand on his shoulder, feeling for him. He worked really hard to get a car, and now it's the second time it ditches him in the middle of the night! And for no good reason, too. I mean, I'd be pretty offended too, if someone came bitching about my outfit – not that Mikaela was bitching, as much as just making a valid point (since he sort of _is_ a supper advanced space-robot) – but you don't see me running off.

Then again, the car does have a point of its own; he has every right to get offended after being insulted like that. Wait, back up; am I seriously having an internal debate over who's right in this situation: Mikaela or the car? I need a life; all this Sci-Fi, supernatural stuff is getting to me.

Sam groans in frustration, knotting his fingers in his hair as he stares after his car in disbelief. Three jaws hit the ground when the said car comes right back, only it isn't the same car; it's some made up sports car that the coolest car on school grounds ain't got nothing on! I think it's the same car model, but it's brand new and shiny!

"_What_?" Sam says, dragging out the word, at the same time as I say "bloody hell." 'Bloody hell' is like my way of saying 'holly fuck' only more… respectfully? Cursing in British doesn't really ever sound like actually cursing to me, because British people make it sound so… ok.

We rush up to the car and Sam opens the door. Mikaela climbs into the back, where she makes herself comfortable, and I get into the passenger seat. Sam runs around that car, getting into the driver seat, getting a feel of the new car. I have to admit, as little as I know about cars and how you're supposed to tell if they're comfortable for you, but this car is amazing!

I let out a hushed "wow", looking at Sam with wide eyes. "Sam... Best. Car. _Ever_." He grins at me like an idiot. The car pulls away, driving on, out of the tunnel. Somehow, after a little while, and since Sam doesn't really need to actually drive, our hands find each other in the middle, fingers lacing. I smile at him, feeling so happy and content.

From behind us, I hear Mikaela sigh, and steal a quick glance at the girl, finding her leaning her elbows on her knees, and her chin resting on her palms, a dreamy expression on her face. I don't even have time to give her a questioning look because she composes herself, covering up really well with a yawn and laying down, and I turn back to Sam.

We just drive for a while, the car seeming to have a destination of its own in mind, but like most of tonight, I don't really care. I'm perfectly fine where I am, with my best friend and his car.

Later in the night we drive up to a gate with a stop sign and a warning saying "closed for renovation" and "no trespassing". The car slows down, carefully pushing the fence open as it drives past, either ignoring the signs, or just not understanding what they say. I'm willing to bet that it's really both. I internally chuckle at that.

The car parks outside of an observatory with a name I couldn't hope to pronounce, and we get out. I help Mikaela out of the back seat, and then make my way over to the front of the car. I lean on it a little, supporting myself against it with one hand. I feel mine and Sam's hand intertwine as we watch the sly lit up by four gigantic balls of what I think is space-rock; like meteors or something – I skipped the day the teacher told us the difference between meteors and meteorites and whatever else there is out there.

They flash, making a really loud noise as they near and I instinctively hide behind Sam, seeing as he's the older one here, and just this once, I'll let him do the protecting – not that he does much protecting, seeing as he tries to hide behind _me_ as the four meteors zoom overhead, one directly over us and into a flied far back. I let out a soft, inaudible whimper, turning back to look at where it went. A quarter a mile or so behind us, I hear a loud crashing noise, and since I can hear it from just under a half-kilometer away, I'd say the 'caboom' was one hell of a **caboom!**

I exchange a quick glance with Mikaela and Sam. "Race you," I challenge, and, letting go of Sam's hand, skate after the meteor. Ya, not the smartest thing to do, given that we don't even know what it is; but who cares what it is? It's awesome, and it's dangerous, and it's not something I will ever see ever again in my entire life! I'm going, and I don't care what the logical side of me says.

My curiosity will be the death of me, I just know it.

So we bolt after the space-ball, racing to where it landed, or crashed, or whatever it did. But soon enough, my asthma from earlier catches right back up with me, and I start panting like I've just ran the marathon. I start wheezing, and making 'dying' sounds, so Sam grabs my hand, helping me skate on. After a little while, we come upon a field, and I have to, once again, run in skates – which isn't the best idea, especially in my condition. But I ignore that, like the dumb person that I am, and run through the field, Sam pulling me after him.

It's a lot easier with a boost, and soon Mikaela joins in to help me run. We finally make it to a crater that the space-ball created when it crashed into the earth at God knows what speed.

Before us, what appears to be – and I'm getting this knowledge from every Sci-Fi movie and TV show I've ever watched – a transport pod of some sort, begins to shift, tiny little pieces of thing I could never hope to name, all twisting and turning and making mechanical noises. And after a little while, the thing begins to unfold, pieces sliding open like a puzzle, only instead of the pieces being lifted, they slide into each other, folding in, opening the pod.

We watch in awe and shock and fear – and I get out my phone and take pictures while it's still intact – as what's inside _stands up_. I huge, thirty feet tall, silver _thing_ that resembles – and I'm using the word 'resembles' here very loosely – a human; tow arms, two legs, and a head, which for me, is close enough. And thanks to the movies and TV shows about aliens, I part of me holds on to that strand of hope that this is one of the good guys. Of course, the human side of me argues that "why would a good alien bother to come to Earth? What's in it for him?" Then again, the hopeful side of me retaliates be saying "why would it want to enslave a weak race like ours, with an expiration date of eighty years?"

Both sides of me have good arguments, and while I have a small internal battle between weather I should stay and watch, and whether I should run, screaming, the thing disappears; it just kind of runs away, and I missed it because I'm too busy deciding whether it's good or bad. Oh damn it! I freaking hate this! I can't believe I missed it! That was the coolest thing in the world; it totally just crash-landed, and we were the only ones here, so technically, we were like the welcoming comity or something, and now it's gone because I spaced out! I can't believe this! I can't believe _me_!

Oh well, at least I saw it come to Earth, so that's gotta count for something. And I have a bunch of pictures. I look down at my phone, scrolling through them all, and ever though some pics are smeared, I don't have the guts to erase a single one of them. Oh the human race; the world can be ending, and we'd stand around, taking pictures.

I quickly make a new folder, humorously titling it "space-balls" and put several firewalls around it before putting all the photos I just took into it, and then put it away. Then we run back to the car, still waiting where we found it. By the time I reach it, I can barely breathe, but I push Sam and Mikaela back when they try to help me. I climb into the car and try to relax, tacking shallow breaths in attempt to bring down the brining in my lungs.

"Stupid asthma, I hate you so much I can't even say," I mutter under my breath. This gets a chuckle from Sam and firm pat on the shoulder. I try shooting him a glare, but then realize how stupid it sounded, and chuckle a little myself, instead scratching my eyebrow… with my middle finger. This only sends the teenage boy next to me into a fit of laughter. He tries to regain himself, but fails miserably.

Later, after a while of driving to wherever we need to be, once my breathing returned to normal, the silence in the car gives us time to rethink over tonight. We, three teenagers, just figured out that Sam bought an alien who posed as his car, and later that four others were coming to Earth. Sam's car invited us to go with him somewhere. I was so scared of it, and of what it will do, but when Sam offered me to come along with him, all of my doubt suddenly went away; disappeared like mist. I wasn't scared, and I wasn't confused. I trusted Sam with this, and no matter what happens tonight, my life will never be the same. In fact, it was never going to be the same ever since day one of grade one, when I offered Sam a Kit-Kat bar and showed him my missing teeth to make him feel better.

Suddenly I burst out laughing at how absurd the whole situation is. Who would have thought that tonight, I'd be sitting inside an alien robot, who disguises himself as a car. Sam and Mikaela look at me as if I'd lost my mind for quite some time – and I guess they have a good point there – and then the situation catches up with them as well, and we all start laughing uncontrollably, hysterically. It's not a sane laugh; no, it's full of fear and uncertainty. It's hysterical and crazy horrified and uncontrollable. We pure our entire selves of tonight into it, letting all emotion go and spilling it into the laugh.

And then we aren't laughing anymore, we're crying. I twist in my seat, and so does Sam, and with both of us facing the back, we get into an insane group hug with Mikaela and wail. We break down and let the night catch up with us. We stay like that the rest of the way, even after we have no tears left to cry. We hold each other tightly, not letting go, like our lives will end if we do.

It's only after a loud honking makes us jump through the roof of the car, that we realize that the car has stopped, and we were at our destination. I look out the window to see that we were in some dirty-ass alleyway that looked like the back of a sushi shop. We let each other go, composing ourselves, and get out of the car, finally accepting all that happened tonight; us almost dying, and meeting aliens being the top two things that were hard to get our heads around. After all, it's not every day that you watch four aliens come to Earth.

Behind us, three cars speed our way, one flashing its lights. And ahead of us, a large truck, painted in flames. I look back, than forward, than back again, than I get dizzy and brag Sam's shoulder for balance. I steady myself, whishing more than anything to take these stupid skates off. I'm not going home tonight, no way; I'm going to Sam's house, and throwing these skates away, and putting normal footwear on, because the skates are making my feet hurt like crazy.

The four cars surround us, and come to a stop before something unbelievable happens. The truck in front of us instantly begins to shift, and just like Sam's car, it unfolds, parts hissing and sliding and shifting, and the thing stands up. Parts click into place and gears shift, and the truck stands up into a thirty-foot-tall robot, just like Sam's – did I seriously just says that the Camaro-robot is Sam's? We watch in wonder as the rest do the same, the night being filled with noises of metal clinking against more metal and parts moving into place until around us, five huge aliens stand tall, the smallest being at least ten feet up.

I do a slow three-sixty turn, looking around with my mouth hanging open as they do so; all of them going from plan cars from the street to metallic giants. How is this even possible? I mean yeah, humans are too tiny and weak and pathetic to be alone in the universe, and none of the movies and TV shows I've watched ever portrayed them as little green men, but this is _way_ over the edge.

And way cool, too.

I come still next to Sam, Mikaela on the other side of him, and we stand in a chain of scared, confused little teenagers as the tallest one – the one in front of us – kneels down in front of us, coming closer to eye-level. I suddenly feel very small. I've never been too much on the tall side. Sam's about a meter-eighty, I'm a meter-sixty five – not big, but not too small either – but right now, I feel like an insect.

And I also feel like I'm being watched, which makes me overly uncomfortable, and I – by force of habit – shrink into myself, and hide behind Sam, peaking at the giant from behind his shoulder. I gulp audibly, beginning to shake ever so slightly. I don't like to be in a crowd at all, and right now, the crowd isn't even human! This is just downright crazy.

I jump backwards a little, startled when the large robot right in front of us speaks. "Are you Samuel James Witwicky, descendant of Archibald Witwicky?" His voice is so loud and powerful that I cringe, feeling even smaller, if that's even possible.

And for some reason, the only thing on my mind is "they know your name," I whisper, my voice barely audible, so that only Sam can hear. Oh and then there is the part where the robot, who isn't even from Earth, actually said 'Witwicky' right. No one ever says it right from the first time, and he said it right twice in one sentence! I have to say that that's pretty impressive – 'Witwicky' is such a tongue-twister; even I have trouble saying it sometimes.

Sam give a tiny "yeah," the even I can hardly make out, but clearly the giant hears it well enough because he continues. "My name is Optimus Prime. We are autonomous robotic organisms from the planet Cybertron." Translation: they're living robots from space; figures.

"But you can call us Autobots for short," one of the ones to the left of us says in a semi-British accent – don't ask me how it's semi-British, it just kind of sounds like it is.

Sam echoes the name, and I echo it after him in my head. Autobots… it does have a nice ring to it, and it doesn't sound menacing or we-will-take-over-your-planet or anything. But still, I feel very uneasy. And it so doesn't help that my felt are killing me and right now, all I want is to sit down – it only makes me feel even more uneasy.

I let out a short-lived shriek when a voice from behind startles us all – 'us all' being the humans. "What's crackin' li'l bitches?" I jump, turning around, my hand flying to my heart, but the wheels on my feet chose to defy me, and it's only a fraction of a second before my arms spread in every direction, trying to catch something – anything – for balance, but it's too late. I hit the ground painfully, and half-huff, half-groan at the sound of my skates clattering against each other – it sounds like I broke a bone of something.

Red with utter embarrassment and humiliation, I reach a hand up and Sam helps me to my feet. He wraps his arms around me, keeping me steady as the one who spoke lets out a snort, and does some cool move I can't name before jumping back onto a car in "one of 'em cool' posses, stating that "this looks like a cool place to kick it." All the while, Optimus Prime introduces him as a first lieutenant whose designation – I think it means name, but I'm not too sure – is Jazz.

I bow my head, letting my brown hair fall over my face and pear at the world from behind the chestnut current, too afraid to show my face to any of them ever again. I just met freaking aliens and I fell! I can't believe myself. I can't believe I humiliated myself like that! Oh my God, Why was I cursed with such a level of public awkwardness; why?

"What is that? How'd he learn to talk like that?" Sam asks in disbelief. Yeah, where _did_ he learn to talk like that? He sounds an awful lot like some sort of rapper or something.

"We've learned Earth languages through the 'World Wide Web'," Optimus Prime states. Oh come on! How unfair is that?! I spend years and year trying to learn French, and all I can say is 'hello, my name is Raven', and they can just download a language like they're a freaking computer?! So unfair; I want to learn languages the fast, too; then I can curse in class, and no one will know what I say. I put a little from behind my hair so no one will see how ridiculously childish I'm acing.

There is a clicking noise behind us, and Optimus Prime motions behind us. "My weapon specialist, Ironhide." I turn around with Sam's help, jerking my head to the side a little, to see better, but I let out a tiny but shrill cry, and cower behind the previously mentioned teen when the weapon specialist activate the cannons attached to both his arms. I hide behind the small barricade that is Sam, shaking like a leaf at the sight of the massive canons of death that are charged and aimed at the three of us. Sam himself is a little shaky, but he manages to hold his ground, unlike me, who screams and hides like a little kid. Then again, I have a strong argument, seeing as those things are scary as hell!

"You feeling lucky, _punk_?" Ironhide says in a challenging tone, and I don't dare move. Oh God, why am I such a coward? Why, oh why?

Optimus Prime warns Ironhide, telling him to ease up, to which he answers "I just wanted to show them my cannons," in an ever-so-slightly upset tone – like a kid who was forbidden to show a new shiny toy to his friends, only he's all grown up and more adult about it, _and_ he's a giant alien from space. So… where did that analogy come from?

Ironhide turns the canons off, and the introductions continue. I have to admit, this thing here is pretty amazing. It's really scary, and I feel like any moment now one of them is going to step on us by accident, but we're meeting aliens! We, three teenagers, who ended up here by accident, were meeting aliens! I can't believe it! This is anyone's dream, especially if you're a fan of Sci-Fi stuff. I have to admit this: I can't even count the amount of times I'd dreamed about being transported into some Sci-Fi, alien-related TV show, like Stargate. And now I was meeting aliens!

Did I mention I was surrounded by metal space-giants?

But the moment I think that, I start being scared again. After all, they _are_ metal space-giants, and squishing us… they wouldn't even notice it.

There is a sniffing sound to the right of me and I turn, brushing my hair out of my face so I could see better, and find the semi-British Autobot from earlier sniffing the air like a doggy. Come to think of it, his face does remind me of a bulldog; all chubby-ish and all and his nose kind of looks like a dog nose.

I shake my head, realizing hoe insulting it would be if I said it out loud, and instantly cut that train of thought, just in case something comes out when it's supposed to stay in my head. "Our medical officer: Ratchet," Optimus Prime announces. The neon green-yellow Autobot make a 'Hm' sound before creating the most embarrassing moment of Sam life – past, present, and future – by saying "the boy's pheromone level suggests he wants to mate with one of the females."

My first thought was 'he can smell it when people want to have sex?' And my second though was 'Sam wants to have sex? Wait; of course, he's a guy, so it's ok'. And my third through was 'EWWWWWWW!' Me, Mikaela, and Sam look between each other awkwardly, and then at the floor. And the fact that Sam was helping me hold my balance by holding me didn't make the situation any better. If anything, the fact that he was holding me only made it more awkward. Ratchet is worse that Judy, I swear.

The whole thing goes silent, and suddenly, I'm very aware of myself, and instantly try to shrink into myself, hiding from all eyes, but of course, it doesn't help, and I, as always, redden in embarrassment, looking down at my feet. I drop my hair back over my face, and shut my eyes in mortification.

The awkward silence is thankfully broken as Optimus Prime brings us all back on track. "You already know your guardian: Bumblebee." I carefully turn to the said Autobot – being Sam's car – who is, I think, showing off his mime/boxing skills, as he punches the air to a song on the radio.

"Bumblebee, yeah?" Sam asks the yellow robot. "So you're my guardian?" Bumblebee gives a small nod to go along with a whirl. _Aw, he's cute_, I think in that voice you use with little kids and puppy dogs. And now that he isn't in full fighting mode, isn't scary at all – then again, looks can be deceiving; after all, he did kick that other robot's ass.

"His vocal processers were damaged in battle," "Ratchet tells us, "I'm still working on them." Awe, that so sad; the poor guy lost his voice. That's so unfair. Ratchet points some sort of laser-pointer thingy at Bumblebee's neck, and he makes a choking sound.

With the show-and-tell over, Mikaela asks the question that's been lurking at the back of our minds ever since we saw Bumblebee for the first time. "Why are you here?"

"We're here looking for the Alspark," Optimus Prime tells us, "and we must find it before Megatron." He puts a slight emphasis on 'before'; just enough to let us knew just how important it is. But… "Who's Megatron?" I ask shyly, and then shrink back into myself, unsure of whether or not it was appropriate to speak. After all, Optimus Prime seems to be their appointed leader; I wouldn't want to be disrespectful.

Optimus Prime raises a hand to his temple – temple? – and the ground beneath our feet falls away into a river of lava. I shriek, grabbing on to Sam and holding on for dear life. We stagger back a bit as the ground crumbles down, things rising from beneath us.

Optimus Prime tells us the story of how a devastating war broke out of his planet, the Autobots fighting for freedom against the Decepticons and their leader, Megatron. The Alspark – which I guess is some powerful weapon or something, since it was so important that they came here to look for it – was lost in space, and Megatron followed it. His journey brought him here, where Archibald Witwicky, Sam's great-great-granddad, found him dormant in to ice of the Arctic.

Archie accidentally activate Megatron's navigating system, which resulted in the Alspark coordinates on Earth to be imprinted on those old glasses that Sam was trying to sell on eBay. Wait! Back up a second; Sam is trying to sell them off!

"How'd you know about his glasses?" Sam asks. Optimus Prime simply answers "eBay." The internet; of course. I love the internet, internet is good; internet is full of interesting things – classified, top secret thing that you need to know how to find, and need to know who to keep yourself a untraceable if you do, but interesting things nonetheless.

"Of the Decepticons find the Alspark," Ratchet says, "they will use its power to transform Earth's machines and built new army."

"And the human race will be extinguished."

That's when something pops into my head: "Hold on, but if you found Sam, won't the Decepticons find him as well? That cop-monster thing found him and attacked him; what if they find where he lives? What about his parents?" Suddenly I'm very afraid for Ron and Judy. What if something happened to them? I feel Sam tense beside me, and place a reassuring hand on his shoulder.

"That is why we must find those glasses," Optimus prime says. "Without them, you and your family will not be in danger. Sam Witwicky, you hold the key to Earth's survival." Yeah, no pressure at all, dude; you're eBay page is only the difference between Earth's life and death. It's just another night.

"Sam, you are so lucky that no one bought them," I tell him. He looks at me, gulping a little. My eyes widen and I'm afraid of what that might mean, but the look in his eyes changes, and in them, I can clearly see him saying 'got you!'

My mouth drops open and I slap him on the arm. "This is no joking matter, you dork!" I scold, only getting a laugh from him. I shake my head. Can you believe this guy?

"I'm sorry!" he exclaims, rubbing his arm, "it's just your face... I-I couldn't help it!" he laughes and I scrowl. "Come on. You should have seen your face! You were all like ahhh!" He make a bad impression of me, his eyes wiser, his mouth open, and his hands up.

I choke back a laugh of my own, smacking his other arm. "Shut up and get your ass in the car, we gotta go," and tell him. The sooner we get those glasses, the better.

**AN: so what was your favorite part? Please tell me what you thought of the chapter, because I really like compliments – or if you have a criticism, please let me know so I can fix the mistake, and make the story better.**

**Also: What is your favorite quote, and who said it?**

**Have a nice day/night, and I will see you all next time.**


	6. Chapter 6

**AN: thank you for the reviews, guys :D I don't have too much to say here, so I don't own Transformers; enjoy:**

"Argh! My feet are _killing_ me!" I exclaim, stressing the word 'killing' to emphasize just how much they hurt. Sam turns to me, his hands resting numbly on the steering wheel, just for show, nodding as if he's interested. "Yes, I know," he says like he's talking to a child "you made it clear the first seven times you said it."

"Oh you should talk; need I remind you about the fifteen tomes you practiced your history class speech on me?" I teas. "Oh yeah," Sam say, "I remember you saying something like 'Oh, yeah, that was awesome. I liked it the first time, loved the second time, and if you do the speech the third time, I'll fall in love and get married. I think I earned teasing you, don't you think?" he says in mock offence. I roll my eyes, shoving him in the arm.

"Hey, you try spending all day running around in rollerblades," I retaliate. "I much have sprained my ankles like a dozen times or something! I swear I'm never wearing rollerblades again," I groan, wanting nothing more but out of them and into normal footwear. "_When_ are we going to get to your place? I _need_ my shoes!" I complain like a child, whining about wanting to watch their favorite movie.

"I don't even know where we are," Sam says. I huff, turning to look out the window, resting my chin on my hand. Just as I do, we drive into a back lain, and I instantly recognize it. "Yes!" I exclaim, throwing my hands up… only to have them painfully hit the roof of the car. But I ignore the pain, the relief overshadowing it. "Thank you, Bumblebee, you're the best!" Home at last! Ok, it isn't my house, obviously, but my shoes are here! My feet aren't going to fall off!

"Whoa, never seen you this happy to be home," Sam says with a playful smirk, giving me a punch on the arm. I can't help but laugh at this. "Oh shut up," I say through a chuckle. "My feet hurt and I can't wait to get out of the skates. I don't think I'd ever missed shoes this much, especially given that I'm not the biggest fan of wearing anything on my feet." I've always preferred to be barefoot, for some strange reason. "Come on, already."

We get out of the car, and I skate around to Sam's side. "Watch the cars, please, I'll be right back." I nod in understanding. "Got it- wait, watch them? You make it sound like they're little kids," I joke.

"Raven, I'm serious, I need like, five minutes, 'k?"

"Yup, go," I say, turning him around and pushing him in his house's direction. Then I turn to Mikaela. "So… who are we supposed to watch them?" I ask, having no clue what to do to fill the now silent back lain. Mikaela shrugs, shaking her head. "Um… we can…" she trails off, and a moment later, we suddenly burst out laughing at the ridiculousness of the situation.

"I can't believe I'm here," she says, echoing her words from yesterday. Oh boy, has it really been yesterday that Sam gave her a lift home? It felt like days. "I mean, like last night, my biggest problem was my Trig homework, and now the guy who gave me lift home yesterday is trying to save the world or something." She shakes her head, a little hysterical. And who could blame her. The boy I knew my whole life was trying to make money by selling an old pair of broken glasses on the net, and those glasses turn out to be the key to either the saving, or destruction of our whole planet! Who did things change so fast?

How did my little Sci-Fi film obsession turn into my life? I'm living a nerd's dream! Sam, Mikaela and I were nearly killed by a metal death-machine this morning, and less than an hour ago, I met a whole other race of beings, from a different planet! And they needed our help! Well, sort of. They needed a pair of glasses that Sam had. What are the odds! Of the six billion people on Earth, what were the odds that it'd be Sam and me?!

Sam; the awkward kid who talked a lot when he was nervous, and got all twitchy when he was afraid of something or someone; and me; a coward who couldn't hold her ground against a girl who was three months younger than me; who failed grade ten and had to go to summer school, and couldn't bother to come to class at least twice a week.

The two of us, of the whole world! How that was possible is beyond me, but whatever supernatural forces – because this couldn't possibly be just a form of luck; good or bad – caused this, it was unbelievably amazing… I guess.

"Unbelievable, isn't it?" I say, turning back to the lineup of cars. She nods in agreement.

"Yeah; I didn't think it was possible for cars this big to fit in an alley this small." There is a moment of silence, and then both of us burst out laughing. "Good one!" I get out through the laugh clutching my stomach.

We take a few deep breaths, trying to calm ourselves. "No but really," Mikaela says, "it's quite incredible. And I think I'll find it even more unbelievable in a few days, when I will fully comprehend today. I think my brain didn't fully catch up with my eyes and ears."

"Same here," I agree, half-nodding, and half-shaking my head. "I don't know how I still didn't faint, after today. I mean, first there was the cop-monster, and then this…"

"It's so _weird_."

"You said it." Just then, at the five minute mark – not a second later – the Autobots start to shift. I clap my hands over my mouth, cutting off a shriek before it starts, and stagger backwards, moving out of the way as Optimus Prime begins to shift into his robot form and stand up. In his struggle to do so in an alley this size, he rushed a fence, and can't help snorting. Then I remember that he or any of the others – who are doing the same – should get up.

"Hey, guys, what are you doing?!" I whisper-shout at them, motioning for them to get back down. "Someone can see you!"

"The buy said to wait five minutes," Ironhide states as if it's the most obvious thing in the world. My jaw falls on the ground. "I know what he said!" I whisper-shout. "It's a figure of speech! It means 'a short amount of time'. It doesn't mean literally five minutes!"

"We need the glasses," Optimus Prime states. I huff in frustration. "You think I don't know? But give him some time! IF his parents see you, they're going to have a cow!" All five Autobots freeze, looking down at me with a confused look. I slap my hand over my eyes, face-palming and groaning. "It means they will freak out," I explain, trying to remain calm, and not freak out, myself.

Optimus Prime says yet again that they have to get those glasses as soon as possible, and despite that Mikaela joins me in the pleading for them to stay still, they all follow Optimus Prime to Sam's house. Mikaela and I exchange a panicking look, eyes wide, before hurrying after them.

We run into Sam's back yard just as he desperately tries to steer them along the path which his dad spent all of yesterday's afternoon laying down, and not get any marks on the grass. It fails though, and in his attempt to keep Sam in his field of vision, steps on the really nice fountain, shattering it to bits. Sam's tries to contain a muffled scream of absolute frustration. "Oh no!" he cries out. Oh no, Ron made Sam and me help him put that there! I spent a whole day installing a fountain! Oh they better not wreck the flowerbed; because that's a day with Judy I wouldn't want to live through again. Don't get me wrong. Judy is a lovely woman, but if she starts talking about things like me and dating, it's not something I ever want to hear again. I swear, that woman has now shame when it comes to things like dating, and sex, and the rest.

"Woops, my bad," Optimus Prime says, with what I think is a disguised chuckle. Whoa… hearing one of them use such a human phrase as 'whoops, my bad' sounds so weird and out of place, that it's funny!

"Oh, I- d- could- you couldn't wait for five- you couldn't wait for five minutes?!" Sam freaks out, stumbling over his words in anger. "I told you to-to _stay_! To _stay_!"

Sam spots us, and rushes over in annoyance, talking fast and in a hysterical tone. "I told you to watch them!"

"Well, Sam, we did try to stop them," I say, folding my arms over my chest.

"If you hadn't noticed, there is little we can do against giant alien robots," Mikaela supports me, mimicking my actions, and shifting her weight. Good point; it isn't like we can just hold them on place. Sam rolls his eyes, giving up trying to tell us anything.

"This is bad," Sam says, and now it's my turn to roll my eyes. Way to state the obvious. I hear barking and pear over Sam's shoulder as he turns around. Ahead of me, I see that little pets, Mojo, barking up at Ironhide.

"No," Sam manages to get out on horror as I watch in equivalent disbelief and shock as the little sucker raises a leg and pees all over Ironhide's foot. Oh boy… or not. Maybe now Ironhide will step on him, and I will never have to hear that thing bark up at me and do unmentionable things to my leg ever again!

"Mojo, Mojo! Off the robot!" Sam cries desperately, running after his dog just as Ironhide flicks him into the air. I can't help but smirk a little. I never liked small dogs, especially Mojo, since he just couldn't keep his dog habits to himself and the Witwicky family.

"Wait; no, no, no, no, no! Easy, easy!" San shouts, picking Mojo up into his hands just before Ironhide puts his foot down on him. Oh well; maybe next time. "This is Mojo, this is Mojo," he says, trying to calm Ironhide down as the robot charges his canons, aiming them at the Chihuahua. The moment that canons are aimed, my heart jumps to my throat. "He's a pet of mine. Ok, that's all. Put the guns away, put them away." I find myself as Sam's side, staring up at the Autobot weapon specialist.

"Get those guns away from Sam," I say in a hard tone.

"You have a rodent infestation." I have to agree with that. "Shall I terminate?" Yes please.

"No, no, no! He's not a rodent, he's a Chihuahua! He's my Chihuahua. We love Chihuahuas!" Sam says, motioning to him and me. I give him a look that says 'speak for yourself'.

"He's leaked lubricants all over my foot," Ironhide says angrily. I give him a compassionate look. "I hear you; be grateful that that's all he's gone to your foot." Sam shoots me a glare, scolding Mojo for what he's done as Ironhide echoes him, saying "_bad_ Mojo," and I choke down a laugh. He mumbles angrily about how now his foot will rust.

Sam runs – between two huge robot feet – to his back door, getting a "just hurry" from Optimus Prime. Sam hurries inside, rushing to look for the glasses.

"Autobots, recon," Optimus Prime orders. That's when something pops randomly into my mind.

"Hey Mikaela," I whisper, leaning to her so only she can hear me. "Since Optimus Prime, is, you know, apparently the leader here, do you think that, back in the alley, we should have bowed or something? You know, in respect or whatever?" Mikaela shrugs. "I have no idea. I thought of that, too, but let's leave it the way it is. I really don't want to ask one of them if we should bow or something. That would just be really awkward." Yeah, I'm with you on that one.

I nod, moving away. My feet remind me for just how much they hurt, and how much they want out of the rollerblades, and I wince at the pain.

Mikaela walks off towards Optimus Prime, pointing up at the window to Sam's room. I don't pay attention to what she is saying, but I have a pretty good idea what it might be. Optimus Prime bends down, offering his hand and she climbs on, and he lifts her to the window. I limp over to Optimus Prime as well, and he lends me a hand as well, lifting me to the window. Inside, Sam is groaning at that the Autobots are being loud.

He reaches both hands to me, and I take them, pulling myself to his window, and – with great struggle – try to pull myself in. I almost slip once, but somehow manage to catch myself in the window frame, making a face of struggle as Sam helps me into his room.

The moment I'm inside, I drop to the floor and frantically work at the laces on my skates, getting the first one off. I groan of pleasure escapes me as the weight of it disappears. Oh that feels so good! At last I'm out of that thing. I take the other one off, taking a few extra seconds to just sit on the floor and enjoy being barefoot.

Sam helps me up to my feet and once standing, I just freeze, taking in the beautiful feeling of my feet being planted flat on the floor. I didn't know what I bliss it was, to stand on my feet and not have to hold on to someone to keep from rolling away.

"I'll be back in a second," I say, getting out of the room and across the hall, to the guest room where some of my stuff is. Seeing as I stay here an awful lot – more than at my house, really – I have at least three pairs of shoes in the guest room closet. I get a pair of old Converse – never before have I loved shoes as much as I do now!

"Ok, I'm back," I say, running back into Sam's room. "Where do I look?' I ask as I see the two other teens looking for the glasses.

"Ok um… look on my desk. Oh and, and then on these shelves, ok?" Sam says. "Mikaela, you look all along this wall," he says, motioning to a wall, "and I'll look in the corner here." Sam rushes to a particularly messy corner of his room as Mikaela duck sunder the desk I'm shuffling over.

Sam is instantly at our side, freaking out. "No, no, no! Not there! That's my private… sorry." He grabs a box, which I recognize. I have to choke down a laugh at the memory of when I accidentally found that in his closet while I was looking for a shirt of his. We were trying to back a cake and he got flower all over his shirt and wanted a new one. So I went to look, and found the box. And being the curious person that I am, I decided to take a peak.

Oh I still have those photos for blackmail.

""You just told me to-" Mikaela starts, but Sam cuts her off. "-I didn't mean to look inside my treasure chest." I shuffle over everything on the table, finding no glasses case, and rush over to the shelves on the wall across from the window. I skim over them, a few things falling as I do so. I pick them up, stuffing them where there is room and where my hands can reach without me having to move, and go on, looking further down the shelves, trying to find the glasses.

"Ok Sam, where were you last with them?" I ask.

"Well, I was in school. And then I went to buy a car, and I came home. I left them here. I swear I left the bag in my room," Sam says in a hurry. That's when we hear a noise outside. Sam and Mikaela rush over to the window and I'm quick to follow, getting on my tippy-toes and looking over Sam's shoulder to see quite the sight.

All the Autobots in their car forms, parked in the back yard like it's a parking lot. The grass is full of turned over dirt and grass, and craters from the Autobots' feet, stepping all over the place. My hand goes to my mouth. Oh God… Judy will make Sam and Ron – and most likely me – to clean all that up!

"No," Sam says desperately, getting to the same conclusion as me. You couldn't have found a better place to park?! "No, no, no; this isn't hiding," he says hysterically, barely believing what's in front of him. "This isn't hiding; this is my back yard, not a truck stop!"

"Sam, come on, we better hurry," I urge, pulling him away from the window. Sam looks through the lockers standing next to his bed while I finish looking over the shelves. "It's not here," I say as Mikaela starts calling Sam's name over and over again, to get his attention.

"Sam, he's back." We run to the window and I lean over Sam's shoulder, following his gaze to Judy's flowers that line the house. Oh… My… God. No! Not Judy's flowers! You know what, mister? Alien robot or not, you're the one fixing these! I refuse to spend another day like that last one with Judy!

"Oh no; no, no, no; that's my mom's flow-"

"Oops." Yeah, well, 'oops' won't fix anything, now will it?! Oh God!

"Listen; you gotta listen to me; if my parents come out here and see you, they're gonna freak out," Sam warns in panic as Optimus Prime rests his hands against the house. My only hope is that he isn't leaning on them because he's paying for the damage if he makes two giant holes in the side of the house.

And I don't even want to imagine how hard it would be to explain to someone.

"My mother's got a temper." Optimus Prime sighs, shaking his head a little.

"We _must_ have the glasses," he says, stressing the word 'must'.

"Look, I've been looking for the glasses; they're not here; they're definitely not here," Sam says. Optimus Prime pinches the bridge of his nose – or at least where a nose would be on a human – groaning. Ok Sam, bad choice of words. I jump in, trying to make things sound like they aren't all that bad. "But we haven't look through the rest of the house yet; I'm sure they're somewhere there," I say hopefully. Maybe Sam left them in the garage last night or something. "Don't worry, we'll find them," I assure, hurrying away from the window to look anywhere that we hadn't messily turned over yet. It would be so much easier to find of the room was clean. Oh thank God we aren't looking in my house.

"Keep searching," Optimus Prime says – no, orders – almost angrily. I gulp at the sound of that, not liking it one bit. He can be really scary. I better remember to stay on his good side.

Sam tries to talk him into staying put for another five minutes. "Autobots, fall back," Optimus Prime orders his comrades, moving away from the window as Mikaela frantically searches the room as I run Sam's bathroom, which is attached to his room, and look through all the cupboards, muttering "come on," over and over again as I do so. Where are you?! They're getting restless, and it's only been about seven to eight minutes.

"Outside, I hear "Move!" And then "get away." And then someone else, saying "what's the matter with you? Can't you be quiet?" And the sound of an electric wire being short-circuited, followed by an explosion – one much bigger than the one that happens when you touch two live wires to each other, or, say, hotwire a car – I was it on TV – or short-circuit someone's fuse box as a prank – guilty. Screaming sirens, breaking glass, and crashing noise.

The lights flash and it's silent for a moment as I make my way back to Sam's room, hands spread in a 'what's going on?' question, a confused expression on my face. I join Sam by the window, looking over his shoulder, out into the street where the green one – Ratchet… I think – lays on the ground on a pile of what used to once be a flower stand.

"Whoa, that was tingly." And then he… moans? Ew, gross.

"Yeah, that looks fun," Ironhide grumbles sarcastically, a few more sparks exploding out of the generator on the electric pole. Then the entire street goes black. Oops.

"Great going," I whisper sarcastically. How very graceful of you. Apparently they might be mighty warriors on a battlefield, but they're not all that when crammed into small spaces. I roll my eyes. Oh this is just perfect. I turn to Mikaela, who gives me a desperate look.

"Sam?

"Sammy?" Oh crap; parents! I turn to Sam, now all three of us panicking. And to add to that, Optimus Prime appears at the window a powerful light lighting the room. We wave our arms frantically, telling him to turn the light off.

"Sam?"

"Sam?!" Hide, hide, hide! We hurry around the room – which suddenly because very small –trying to find a place to hide; a place which apparently doesn't exist.

"Sam, are you in there? How come the door is locked?" Ron asks, knocking on the door. Sam tries to get the Autobots to turn the lights out and hide as well.

"You know the rules: no doors locked in my house." Sam shoves Mikaela and me to his bed, motioning for us to duck and hide as Ron starts counting down from five.

"… Ok, stand back!" I hear Ron call. Just then, the door opens.

"What's up… what's with the bat?" Sam asks. Bat? What bat?

"Who were you talking to?" Ron asks.

"I'm talking to you," Sam says, like it's the most obvious thing in the world.

"Why are you so sweat and filthy?" Judy asks him quizzically.

"I'm a child; you know, a teenage."

"We heard voices… and noises… and we thought maybe…"

"What was that light?" Ron asks, apparently getting into the room, by the sound of it.

"There is no light, dad, there is no light!" Sam panics, trying to get his dad out of the room. They start arguing over here the light came from. "You can't just bounce into my room like that; you gotta knock, you gotta communicate," Sam says, trying to get his parents to stop, and hopefully leave.

"We did-"

"-I'm a teenager-"

"-We knocked-"

"-You didn't knock, you were screaming at me." They argue on between themselves, and I feel more and more awkward, squatting on the ground, hiding and eavesdropping on the whole thing. It felt wrong and weird, and God knows what Judy might say next.

"For peat sakes, why are you so defensive?" Judy asks in a high-pitch voice. "Were you…masturbating?" Talk about jinxing it. I look over at Mikaela, who is wearing a part-confused, part-scared, and part-sorry expression on her face. I chose this moment to put everyone out of their misery, and before anyone can make a sound, I stand up, clearing my throat. I feel myself blush a deep red as my eyes land on Judy and I look down at the floor.

Sam flushed an equally deep shade of red, hiding his face from sight of anyone as everyone stares at me for a moment that, under the circumstances, seems to last forever.

"Oh, Raven!" Judy's shrill voice breaks the silence, a wide smile spreading over her face. "I didn't know you are here! I'm sorry you had to hear our little…" Yeah, I'm sorry I had to hear that, too. "What are you doing here so late? Oh, don't tell me; you're staying here."

"No, actually; I have a school assignment I need to catch up on… Sam was just helping me…" I trail off. That lie was atrociously dreadful. I was always an awful liar, especially face-to-face. On the phone I could still fool people, but in person, and to someone I knew very well – like Ron and Judy – I was horrible.

And it's so 'Judy' to take it all the wrong way, because her face lights up like a Christmas tree. "Oh sweeties, you don't have to hide anything! It's perfectly ok if you two, you know… were…"

"What? _Mom_! We were not- mom, we're friends!" Sam exclaims, staring at his mom in shock. The older woman just shrugs. "Ron and Hermione were friends," she states, and the two of us blush a deep red. In fact, I don't think I've ever blushed this deep a shade – and I've blushed a lot in my short little life.

Sam and I look at Ron pleadingly, but he only gives a chuckle. "Oh, kids these days." Thanks a lot, Ron; it's nice to know there is someone on our side (note the sarcasm). "And before you all change the subject, we saw a light. I don't know what it was..." he says, walking towards the bathroom, "… but we saw it."

I hear a muffled, barely audible "whoa," and a moment later, the house shakes again, just as it did when Retched crashed.

Ron freaks out, shouting about an aftershock, and climbs in the tub, hiding. Just then, the lights come back on. I shoot Sam an embarrassed glance, my face in a silent apology. _I'm sorry_, I mouth, and turn my gaze away again. I ignore the rest of the nonsense the Judy mumbles on about, deciding that not hearing any of it will be better.

Thankfully, Mikaela chooses then to – thank you! – stand up, out of her hiding spot. Judy notices her, realizing how wrong she was with her assumption, and apologizes for Mikaela having to hear the little discussion. No amount of apologizing will ever make things ok between you and me, Judy. This is worse than last time!

"Ok, mom," Sam says, saving us, "I need my bag; did you see it?"

"Yeah, it's in the kitchen…" We don't hear the rest of what she was gonna to say. We rush past her, out for his room, and down the stairs and into the kitchen. At last! Finally we found them! I can't believe looking for a pair of glasses could be so stressful!

Sam," I say, as he cheeks the glasses in their case. "Sam, I'm sorry. I didn't mean for it to come out that way. I'm not good at lying and, well…"

"Hey, it's not your fault. Besides, Mikaela showed herself; thank you, by the way," he says turning to Mikaela briefly, "so mom didn't go too far." I smile at him, both of us still blushing a little.

"Ok, you distract my parents, I gotta get the glasses to them," he says, referring to the Autobots. I nod, but just as I do, the doorbell rings.

**AN: and this would be a cliffhanger if we didn't all already know what will happen. So what do you think? What was your favorite part? Oh and, I know it didn't come up yet, but just to be clear: no, Raven does not have huper0human super powers. She's just a girl; she doesn't get some sort of ability all of the sudden, just so you know. I will try to stick as close to the canon as possible – although obviously that won't be too much, since Sam doesn't end up with Mikaela.**

**Please tell me what you think of the chapter because I always like to hear what my dear readers think.**

**Also: What is your favorite childhood movie? Mine is Lion King. Anyway, I hope you liked the chapter, and I will see you all, my dear readers, next chapter. Bye!**


	7. Chapter 7

**AN: hello my lovelies, I'm back with another chapter, and I'd like to thank you all for liking this story as much as you do *squeal*! You're the best.**

CandyCaneKisses101**: thank you! And yeah, I also thought the HP reference was kind of cute :D**

**And I will not be keeping you any longer, so please, enjoy:**

"Uh… Sam? Are you expecting visitors tonight?" I ask, raising my eyebrows. Sam's eyes widen a little in confusion as he shakes him head, no. I frown, looking to the living room, where Ron – who, with Judy already made it down stairs – walks to the front door. I hear the front door open, and the three of us keep really quiet, listening to who it may be. "Ronald Wickity?" I hear a man ask, saying 'Witwicky' wrong, just like everyone else.

"It's 'Witwicky," Ron corrects him in annoyance. Yeah, you can't argue with that it's very annoying to have everyone say your name wrong; trust me, I know a little about that. "Who are _you_?"

"We're the government," the man says. My eyebrows raise so high, that for a moment I'm afraid they will fall off my forehead. The government? What is the '_government' _doing at the Witwicky residence? I look over at Sam, who is frowning at me.

"Sector seven," the man says.

"Never heard of it," Ron says. Yeah, me neither – and that says a lot about their security level, technology wise.

"Never will," the man states in a bored tone, like he's above Ron somehow. Ok, that's kind of really ride of him. Since when is he somehow better than Ron? Ron is one of the coolest people I know. He can be very harsh sometimes, but he's also really awesome. He's the reason I went to Disney World! That was one of the biggest highlights of my whole life! There is no way this guy has a right to speak to Ron like that!

"Your son in the great, great grandson of Captain Archibald Wickity, is he not?"

"It's _Witwicky_," Ron says, clearly annoyed with the man. Come on dude, you've been corrected once already. Can you at least _try_ to say it right? It's not just annoying anymore, it's downright _disrespectful_.

"May I enter the premises, sir?" the man asks, and when Ron doesn't protest, I get the feeling that he entered the 'premises' before he even finished the sentence.

"Ron," I hear Judy's shrill voice, "there are guys all over the front yard!"

"What the hell is going on here?" Ron questions, sounding a little insulted. Yeah, I sure as hell would be if someone walked into my house for no reason, and started walking around like they own the place – I don't really know what the man is walking around like, but the mental image of him the I created from hearing his voice sure looks like it.

"Your son filed a 'stolen car' report last night, "We think it's involved in a national security matter," the man says. Oh, so that's what it's about. I look over at Sam, sticking my tongue out at him. "Ha," I whisper to him in a gloating tone, "I told you it want' me; it was _you_." He spreads his arms out, as if to say '_what_?' and I stifle a laugh. Ha-ha-ha, I knew I didn't do anything!

And hold up… "Sam… did he just say you're 'stolen car' is involved in a security matter?"

"You don't think that…" Sam trails off, eyes wide in fear. I shake my head, the same emotion quickly overtaking me. Do they… can they know about…? No, it's not possible. Or is it? They are, after all, some government agency I never heard of. They probably saw them enter the atmosphere of something, and got crazy energy readings – something their size _must_ give off a crazy energy signature. It's was definitely far more powerful that a rock from space, which is what they looked like.

"National security?" I hear Ron ask, totally confused.

"Yes, national security," the man says, sounding bored out of his mind, like he couldn't care less about the person he's addressing. Heck, from the tome of his voice, I'm willing to bet that he isn't even looking at Ron while talking to him.

"-My God Ron, they're everywhere!" I hear Judy complain in a voice a pitch too high. "There are guys in suits all around the house! Look at this!"

"-Could you stay off the grass?!" I hear Ron shout at someone. Oh he's obsessed with his path. Then again, he _did_ spend all day, trying to lay it out. I'd be pissed if I did all that work, and it got ignored, too.

"-They're pulling bushes out of the ground, good Lord!" Judy screams in shock. There go her flowers. Oh boy, I can't spend another day, planting flowers with her! And they were so pretty! You ruined mine and hers hard work! Do they have no consideration for a person's hard work?!"They gotta get their hands off my bush!"

"-Drop the bat, ma'am," the man cuts her off, "I'm carrying a loaded weapon." Is that… did… did he just _threaten_ Judy?! My mouth falls open at the nerve of the guy – whoever he may be. I feel my face burn up in bright red in anger. Judy may just be the mom of my best friend, by we're close, and when people think they can threaten the people close to me…

"You better get those guys out of my garden, or I'm gonna _beat_ the _crap_ out of them," I hear Judy hiss at the man, who is apparently the one in charge here. Way to go, Judy! I have to admit, as crazy and bubbly as Judy is, she can also be very intimidating when she wants to be. Believe it or not, she was expelled from school when she was in grade eight, for landing a guy who was three years older than her, and weighted about one and a half times more than her, when he thought he can pick on her little sister. She managed to break his left arms, bruise his ribs, and knock out his front teeth. She even got a few bite and nail marks on him.

Moral of the story: if Judy threatens you over something that is important to her – even if it's something simple, like flowers – you better recognize and back off, because she means business.

The three of us look between ea h other, looks varying between worry, and fear, and concern, because even though Judy can be hard core, the man said he was carrying a loaded weapon, so maybe threatening him was not the smarts move on her part. So we choose that very moment to leave the kitchen, going into the living room, where, even though I heard a lot, the sight still surprises me. There are about half a dozen people there, walking around, taking samples of things, and scanning furniture with high-tech-looking scanners you see in movies. Around the house, I both see and hear at least another dozen people. Outside, there aren't any less.

"What is this?" Sam asks.

"Hollow son!" the man says, pretending to be enthusiastic – and failing miserably. His gaze alone is enough to make me very uncomfortable, and I, very heroically, inch away, hiding behind Sam as I usually do, leaving the talking to him. I am _so_ cursed! Why can't I have the guts to give this guy a piece of my mind about walking around here, acting the way he does?! "Is your name Sam?"

"Yeah" Sam says, looking around in confusion.

"Well I want you to come with us." Wow, what?! Oh no he don't! I get out of my hiding place behind Sam, stepping in front of him. Ron and Judy both stand in front of me, protecting the both of us. Sam places a hand on my shoulder, moving me back behind him protectively. I would normally protest, but that little act was just about all that I could take, so hiding behind my 'Sam' shield was welcomed. I huddle behind him, peering over his shoulder as an argument breaks out.

"Wow, you are way out of line!" Ron says sternly, obviously trying very hard to not shout at the man, glaring at the man in black.

"Sir, I am asking _politely_," the man – I'll call him Steve; he kind of looks like a Steve – tells Ron rudely, "back off." You call _that_ polite? I shoot him a glare, which I assume he doesn't see or care about.

"You're not taking either of them," Ron says in a definite and slightly menacing tone. If Steve is smart enough, he'll back off himself. You don't mess with a protective parent. And it shouldn't take me by surprise where Ron mentions both Sam _and_ me, but it kind of does. I mean we're close, and Rom protected me on several occasions – like when I was in grade three; he was called to school when I got caught in a fight, and he threatened to sue the family of the kid who gave me a bleeding nose – but even so, his son still came first before anyone and anythin else.

"Really? You're gonna try to get rough with us?" Steve says, surprised. You'd think no one ever said no to him. Maybe no one ever did, seeing as he's so important – at least he looks like it. But like I said: you don't mess with a protective parent.

"No, I'm gonna call the cops, because there is something fishy going on here," Ron snaps angrily. Steve though, doesn't seem like he feels threatened by this.

"Yeah, there's something fishy about you, your son, your little taco-bell dog-" I actually have to agree with him on that, seeing as Mojo won't stop barking, and it's getting really annoying. Ironhide really should have terminated him. "- And this whole operation you've got going on- is that Raven Montague?" Steve suddenly asks, his eyebrows shooting up, sounding pleasantly surprised.

My eyes widen and my face flushed red when he says my name. How the hell does he know my name? I shrink into myself, trying hard to remain unseen, but I fail miserably when I accidentally make eye-contact with Steve. I let out a tiny half-whine, half-whimper as I do so, grabbing hold of Sam's arm and moving him in front of me. Oh no, a secret government agency that I never heard of knows my name, and can even recognize me. This is bad; this is very bad. No, no they can't know my name. If they know my name, it means they might know of my hobby, which isn't exactly legal, if I may say so. And if they found me, then I'm bound to end up in jail, doing time, and oh my God, I can't go to jail! I was bored, and I wanted to read something interesting! I didn't mean to look at top secret files!

Ok, I did, but I meant no harm; I just wanted to read!

But before Steve could say anything else, a half-bald guy comes up to Steve, whispering something in my ear. Steve's eyes widen in shock, and he looks at the half-bald guy – he looks like a 'Fred', so I'll call him that – in disbelief, and then to Sam, and then back to Fred.

He takes some sort of scanner-looking thing from Fred, turning to Sam. "Son?" he says, coming up to us, "step forward, please." Rom moves away reluctantly, but before Sam can make a step, I grab hold of his arm, panic rising up in me. "Don't," I whimper quietly. Sam turns to look at me, giving me a reassuring look, his eyes saying 'it's ok' and hesitantly, I let him go. But even so, I inch after him a tiny step, trying to stay close.

Steve points the scanner at Sam, and it beeps, speeding up instantly, to the point of almost a single, long beep, rather than a hundred separate beeps. His eyes widen, and he stares at the scanner in half-shock, and half-victory.

"Fourteen rads," he says proudly. "Bingo! Tag 'em and bag 'em!" he shouts to his goons. I blink, momentarily confused as to what's he talking about. But that confusion doesn't last long at all when I feel a pair of strong arms grabs me, pulling my back behind my back, a bracelet clicking painfully around each wrist.

I was in cuffs.

I was in _cuffs_.

It was like a lot of my nightmares coming true. Except for this one very important detail: Sam was being cuffed as well! This puts my anger-meter above scale, and I start thrashing and shouting. "Hey! Let go of us! You can't take us!" I try to wiggle my way out of the man's vice-like grip on my arms, but only hurt myself in doing so. I feel his already death-grip tightens, and instantly, a mental image of hand-shaped bruises on my upper arms appears in my mind.

I cry out in pain, stopping my struggle, and let the man lead me to one of the black cars standing outside the house. "Hey! If you hurt her, you'll be very sorry!" I hear Sam shout from behind me, at the same time as Ron shouts to him to not say anything until they have a lawyer.

The man opens the door to one of the cars, placing a hand on my head to 'help' me in. I shrug his hand off my, snarling at him like an animal, gritting my teeth in anger. Mikaela is seated next to me, and Sam is stuffed inside on the other side, sandwiching me between the two. As soon as Sam is sitting next to me, I turn to him, asking "are you alright?"

He doesn't even nod in confirmation, a question coming from his mouth faster than it forms in his head. "Am _I_ ok? Are _you_ ok? I heard you shout; did they hurt you?"

"No, Sam, I'm fine," I assure him, nodding as I do so, to stop his worrying. I'm bruised, but I don't remember anyone dyeing from a big bruise on the arm. "I'm ok, are you?"

"Yeah, I'm good," he tells me, smiling. I nod, giving a smile of my own.

Everyone gets in the car, Steve on the passenger seat, and we pull away from the house faster than I can even say my name. ""So uh… _ladiesman217_," Steve says, turning to face us, a plastic bag in his hand. From it, he pulls out a phone, which I instantly recognize as Sam's. "That's your eBay username, right?" he asks. I glare at him the best I could. Oh this guy is so getting it! First he says 'Witwicky' wrong, apparently on purpose, then he threatens Judy with a gun – a freaking _gun_! – and now this! Oh even Trent and Jacob don't piss me off as much as he does! Have some common decency to at least introduce yourself properly.

"Yeah, but you know, it was a typo, I ran with it," Sam defends himself. He fidgets around incomparably in his seat, pushing me a little as he does so. I nudge him, giving him a stern look and he calms down a bit, looking down at his lap awkwardly. I roll my eyes, looking to Keala, who is giving me a concealed grin. I stiffen a laugh, biting my lip to assist myself in doing so.

"What do you make of this?" Steve asks Sam, playing a recording on his phone, of Sam panicking about his car standing up, and how those words may be his last words on Earth. As silly as it sounds, I can't really blame him. Heck, I'd probably do the same had I learned that my first car – or really _any_ car – was an alien robot.

"That you?" he asked Sam with a raised eyebrow. Mikaela beats him to speaking, though. "Yeah, that sounds like _Ladiesman__," she says sourly, mocking either Sam or Steve –probably both._

"Two nights ago, at the station, you told the officer that your car _transformed_," Steve says, dividing the word into its two syllables. "Enlighten me," he orders Sam. I have to refrain from rolling my eyes because ass or not, he's still older than me, and he's still far superior – carrying a badge, I believe – to me – who lives where I do, and was fired seventeen times in the past year. And he may be superior to me, and be a jerk, but I'm better than him, and choose to still be as respectful as I can, in my position.

"No, here is what I said, ok? I said my car was stolen, not transformed. The guys at the police station made the mistake, not me. I think one of them was high or something. Either that or his wife left him for his brother," Sam says and my jaw falls on my lap, eyes wide as plates. Ok… Sam seriously went to see The Wizard of Oz, asking him for guts, or huge balls, or something along those lines, because this was so out of character for him! He was never one to take people like Steve silently, but he was never this way! I have to admit it kind of made him a little badass. I smile down at my knees, a small, barely noticeable smile, before shooting Sam a quick glance. He catches my eye, and I instantly know that he saw the smile, because had I not been looking for it, I would have never caught my smile mirror on his own lips for the briefest of moments.

Stave doesn't look convinced, so he continues. "So tell me what you kids know about aliens," he says. Oh, I know this! "Well," I say, "I know that they fly around in a blue box that is bigger on the outside, and the can speak five billion languages, and they can build a device for inter-planetary travel, in the shape of a big circle. The circle has thirty six symbols on it in the shape of consolations and you need to dial the right symbols to go to certain planets. And that they have these living ships that have a symbiotic connection with their pilots…" I trail off, coloring crimson. "Or at least that what Doctor Who, Stargate, and Farscape taught me," I say, but I doubt anyone hears a word of it.

I feel tears work their way into my eyes as Steve's eyes burn into me, threatening to turn me to ash. "Don't play games with me, young lady," he hisses, "Don't make me rethink your position." My what? What's he talking about?

But before I can even think anything else, I hear a rustling noise, and then "you see this? This is an 'I-can-do-whatever-I-want-and-get-away-with-it' badge." I look up, hiding my face in my fallen chocolate-brown hair, and pear at the badge from behind the iron-straight, dark curtain. The badge says that Steve's name is actually Agent Simmons.

Sam tenses next to me, leaning towards mw, his arms slightly over mine, in a subconscious gesture of protection. Mikaela stiffens on the other side of me as well. I mimic their actions, becoming frozen as a statue in fear. I gulp, knowing exactly where this is going and not liking it one bit.

"I'm going to lock you two up forever," Simmons barks sharply, glaring between Sam and Mikaela. Wait… why them and not me?

I feel like speaking up, but exactly half a second, I give up trying, knowing I won't get a single word out, instead turning to Keala, giving her a pleading look, asking her to speak for me. In her eyes I see my very thoughts echoing, and she instantly specks them for both of us.

"Oh, God; you know what? Don't listen to him. He's just pissy 'cause he's got to get back to guarding the mall," Mikaela snapped at him, giving Simmons a dirty look. I mentally applaud her guts – mainly because I know that had _I_ tried saying that, I'd die of humiliation before I can utter five words. Plus, most girls in her place would be hysterical right about now, so congrats to her.

"You, in the training bra, _do not _test me. Especially with your daddy's parole coming up," Simmons says, his tone cruel, and even a little teasing. My eyes widen at what I hear, turning to Keala; so quickly, in fact, that for a second I'm afraid I might break my neck.

"Parole?" I ask in confusion, "What parole? Keala, what's he talking about?"

"It's nothing," Keala hurries to assure us, her voice shaking in panic and fear. "Grand theft auto, that ain't noting," Simmons snaps at her, a smug expression on his face.

"You know those cars my dad used to fix? Well, they weren't always his," she says in shame, a crying note in her voice. Hold up, so, her dad used to steal cars? Wow… And it seems like daddy took her to work after school la little more than expectable. Ouch.

I can see why she wouldn't be too keen on having anyone know. And since she doesn't the only one who has a history of being involved in legal activity, I lean a little closer, giving her as much a reassuring hug as my cuffed hands would allow, letting her know that it was fine. So who cares if she has a record; we all have things we aren't proud if – and trust me, I would know. Besides, I always ground it cool how people in movies could unlock a car with a ruler, and touch two wires together to start it up.

She loosens up at the gesture, giving me a grateful smile. Jeesh, was she thinking we'd stop liking her just because she has a record? Please, Sam knew I get into places I'm not supposed to since grade eight, and all he said then was "Oh my God, that's so cool!" I was really worried about telling him about that, and was scared that he'd turn away, and maybe even turn me in, but instead, he even offered me a few prank ideas. He became my every-now-and-then partner in crime. We screwed with the automatic doors in grocery stores, and played around with the school's student records, and all sorts of things!

"She's got her own juvie record to prove it!" Simmons says and I wasn't now more than ever to slap that grin right off his smug face. "Criminals are _hot_," he hisses, looking over Keala, his eyes going to places they shouldn't go.

"Wow, dude, that's out of line," I spit, my voice full of venom. "You have no right to talk to her like hat, or look at her the way you do, like she's some sort of toy. She's a lady and criminal or not, you need to treat her as such," I tell him, trying oh-so-hard to not flip out at him.

Can you believe this guy? "Listen here, young lady," Simmons says, glaring at me, "The only reason I'm tolerating you right now, is because you are one of the best. Your… current situation is doing you no good at all, so you'd be smart to shut up and let the adults handle this, you got that? 'Cause I can change my mind about you at any moment." Change his mind about me? What is he talking about! This is the third time in the last fifteen minutes; what's about me that he can 'change his mind about'? And what 'current situation' is he talking about?

Just then I notice the scanner front before, on the bash board. And no, it isn't because the thing is sitting right in front of me; no, it's because it suddenly started beeping away, faster and faster, and louder and louder. I only look up for a fraction of a second, and barely get the chance to see the something that was standing on the road, before the car crashes into it, and I go flying forward.

**AN: So what do you say? Did you like it? Please write me a thought or two of feedback, because the more I know about what you think of the story, the more I can make it better. I always take constructive criticism, so don't be afraid to leave any!**

**IMPORTANT: I'd really like a beta-reader for this story, and I don't want to impose myself on anyone, so if any of you want to bets for me, I'd love you and give you free imaginary chocolate cake. So if you're interested, please write it in the review section, or PM me, and I'll get back to you as soon as I can.**

**Review please, ask any question at all that you have, and I will see you all next time. Bye!**


	8. Chapter 8

Although the scream is cut short, it's full of horror, as I leave the seat, and fly forward, right into the windshield, where, outside, is something huge, and metal, and dark, and my heart pounds painfully in my chest at a hundred miles an hour. But just as that happens, a pair of hands grab a vice-like hold of my upper arm, yanking my back with such force that I spin around, my face slamming very painfully into the passenger seat. For a second, I literally feel like I swallowed my tongue from the force of the hit.

I'm yanked back onto the seat, arms tightly holding my in place as the car spins out of control, slamming into more things, and tossing everyone around. Keala and I are tossed to the right, sandwiching San between me and the door – getting an exasperated pained groan from him- and then the other way, this time sandwiching _Keala_ between me and the other door. We all scream in terror as the car slams its rear into something hard, coming to a complete stop. I bury my face in Keala's arm, hiding from whatever it may be, using whoever and whatever I can find – which in this case is Mikaela's shoulder – for a poor excuse of a cover.

I keep screaming a little time after everyone else is stopped, but I don't know whether it was because I was scared, or just for the sake of screaming. I guess it was the later, because I know I have yet to actually become scared. Right now, I'm far too dazed and in shock to really be freaking out as much as I should.

Sam gets off me, and Keala pushes me off her, gasping for air as she does so. I don't even have time to give her an apologetic glance when something crashes through the windows, causing us all to scream again, I duck behind Sam, who in turn tries to hide behind me, but fails when I use my shoulder to shove him back to in front of me. "No!" I scream, "Don't you dare! You're a man; do your job and protect me!" I shout at Sam, hiding behind him as the car begins to swings back as froth. I close my eyes, wanting nothing more than to hug him for dear life as we are all lifted into to air. Everyone shouts and screams and then it's quiet for a second.

And for that beautiful second, I feel like everything might be alright, but, thanks to my luck, I totally jinx it, and I hear glass breaking, and metal snapping in two like a toothpick, and then we fall, for what seems like an eternity, before I find myself pressed into the seat, squished between it and Sam as the car hits the ground.

With my hands locked behind my back, I struggle to wiggle from behind Sam as a bright light shines all around us. Sam moves away, using his shoulder to support me as I get up, squinting up at the shining light. It turns off – thankfully; not blinding me anymore – as the one who shines it tosses the roof of the car, which has been torn off, aside. The said someone turns out to be Optimus Prime.

My shaking goes down considerably and I relax, but I'm still not trusting myself enough to even think about trying to stand up on my own. At least it's Optimus Prime, not anyone else – like that cop monster, for instance. I have to admit that for an awful second I was afraid that he found us again, and was coming back for Sam.

"Oh you A-holes are in trouble now," Sam says with a smirk, leaning between the two front seats. "Gentlemen, I'd like to introduce you to my friend: Optimus Prime." He turns to face me, giving me a victorious smirk, and that look alone is enough to insure me that everything is ok, and the shaking, which has been hovering over me, goes down, and then disappear entirely, only within a few seconds.

"Taking the children was a _bad_ move," Optimus Prime says in a threatening tone, down to Sector Seven agents. Men in black – lol, Men in Black – surround the car, pointing guns up at Optimus Prime, and even though I should know better, it still worries me greatly. He might be a giant alien robot – and apparently the leader – but I'm sure he isn't invincible. So as little damage as bullets can do, I still find myself worrying a fair bit about it. Optimus Prime himself, however, doesn't seem threatened by this at all; not one bit.

"Autobots, relieve them of their weapons," he orders officially. I spin around, seeing his solders come to view, surrounding the cars that have pulled to a stop when we crashed. Ironhide's canons charged and ready to fire Ratchet with a gun of his own.

"Freeze," Ironhide orders, as Jazz reaches a hand out in our general direction and before I knew what was happening, the guns in the agents' hands, were torn away form then, and – I guess – magnetized to Jazz's hand. How that happened is a bit beyond me, but I'm sure that with a half a day's worth of explaining, I'd have it figured out.

Knowing that all the accident was was the Autobots coming after the Sector Seven agents – probably for the glasses, and they got us just because we happened to have those glasses with us – also helped with the shaking a little, I guess, but only a small fraction; the rest is all to Sam.

All human hands are in the air in surrender in, all of that taking place in – somehow – less than ten seconds. I look around, barely breathing. Here, now, they look so different from what they looked like back in the alley; all with gins, ready to shoot. It's actually scary. I bite my lip, feeling like those guns are meant for us just as much as they are meant for the agents. Maybe they are – who knows? I mean, what are we to them, anyway? A bunch of tiny little creatures, I assume. The only reason they came after us is because they need the glasses – at least that's how it would be had I been in their position. Call me selfish, but if I'm running for my life, if someone falls, they're dead to me; I'm not going back for anyone. Who falls behind, stays behind, according to Pirates of the Caribbean.

I turn my undivided attention – in part fear, part respect – to Optimus Prime, who knees down, looking over those in our car, looking calm and collected, yet frightening and empowered and superior. Oh how little it would take him to slam his hand on the car and bring all our lives to an end. I can only hope that he has a long-lasting temper.

"Hi there," Agent Simmons forces out, giving a tiny, nervous wave at Optimus Prime. I gulp a little, as Optimus Prime's expression becomes one of ever-so-slight curiosity.

"You don't seem afraid; are you not surprised to see us?" he states, and I, being the social freak that I am, cower behind Sam, flinching at the sudden volume of the voice. Sam nudges me with his shoulder, telling me that it's all fine, and under that, I feel a subtle "stop being such a coward", that I take, realizing how disrespectful this may be. I take a breath, and straighten up; releasing the bite I'm holding on the inside of my check. He's right: there is nothing to fear, as long as I don't do anything to provoke the danger.

"Look," Simmons says, obviously trying to control the amount of fear that he lets on, "There are… S-7 protocols... ok? I'm not authorized to communicate with you except to tell you I… can't communicate with you." So this means that he can't talk to the aliens because he doesn't have the proper level of clearance, right? I guess I can understand – I know a little something about classified, seeing as I breach that line constantly.

"Get out of the car," Optimus Prime orders him – almost growling – not taking any of the 'security' bullshit. I kind of had this idea that he'd know a little about that, since he's, I think, someone in the military, as he has a First Lieutenant, a Weapons Specialist, and a Chief Medical Officer. Then again, they _are_ all from another planet, so maybe they don't have concept of 'clearance level'. Maybe I should just stop making assumptions about something I know nothing about.

Simmons stars mumbling something about the Autobot's order, but Optimus Prime cuts him off, by nearly _barking_ "Now." I jump, along with everyone else in the car, making my decision final and absolute: I'll be sticking to Optimus Prime's good side.

I struggle to stand up along with everyone else, and climb out of what's left of the car, after Sam, Keala on my tail. Thinking of that, a realization hits me and the moment my feet hid solid ground, I star turning to Keala, opening my mouth to ask her how in the world did she manage to catch me and hold me in place when we crashed. My question, however, was answered before I can make a sound, when I felt her fiddling with the cuffs around my wrists, and moments later, I heard them _click_ open. The swing from behind me, to my sides, and I turn to her, starting at her wide-eyed. She gives me an innocent smile, earning a grin from me.

I give a grateful nod, rubbing my wrists a little, only now realizing that they are hurting. I step out of the way as she frees Sam from his own cuffs, and he smiles at her. "Thanks, Keala."

"Hey, you guys, that stuff you heard before-" he stars, but Sam cuts her off.

"-Hey, it's cool, 'k? I mean, I hang out with this one all the time, so it's nothing new to hear that someone's doing something they aren't supposed to," he jokes, jabbing a thumb at me.

Yeah, he's right: it's alright. And besides, it's not like I'm on the net, causing trouble; I just want to see something interesting. And Keala never meant for anything bad when her dad took her with him to steal cars – no babysitter is no excuse to do that, by the way, so bullshit Mr. Banes; you could have avoided this. Then again, seeing where she lived, maybe leaving her at home wasn't the best option – but it still doesn't excuse taking your little kid out to steal cars.

Still, this wasn't something that was supposed to get out, and now I had one other thing to worry about. Oh that's just what I freaking need right now! I can't be taking out one extra worry on top of everything; I'm in no condition whatsoever to do that!

"Come one, guys; we can talk about this later," Sam says, walking past, to the Sector Seven people – or to be more specific, to Simmons. We follow, joining him at either side like his sidekicks. "What's Sector seven," he demands, and I instantly know that he won't get anything from him. I get my phone from my pocket, flipping it open, and start working my magic on it, fingers moving as light speed – I type at a proud hundred and twenty word per minute. I smirk at the thought, nose glued to my phone, while ears alert to the world around me.

"Answer me!" Sam demands when, as expected, Simmons doesn't answer.

"I'm the one to ask questions here, _not you_, young man!" Simmons shouts at Sam, making me perk up from my phone, files popping up on the screen as I do so. It wouldn't kill you to be polite, you know, I think to myself, rolling my eyes as I go back to searching 'Sector Seven' and what it can possibly be doing – looking for anything that has something to do with aliens, since they seem to know more then they let on about them. More files pop up in front of my face and I brief I do a word search on every one, checking only on those that have something to do with 'extraterrestrial' and anything along those lines on them. I upgraded my phone, to synch perfectly with my laptop, so that I can access as much on my phone as I can on a computer.

Files come and go as the conversation outside continues. "How did you know about the aliens? Keala asks, Sam following her with his own, even more important question. "Where did you take my parents?" Yeah, Simmons, if anything happens to Ron and Judy, you're a dead man. I don't care about Mojo – in fact I wish he doesn't come back – but if Sam's mom and dad are hurt in any way… let's just say that right now, you're someone's son, and when I'm through with you, they're gonna end up with a daughter.

I am not at liberty to discuss this-hey…" Simmons protests, bringing me out of my small gaze. I look up, seeing Sam dig into Simmons' pocket, getting his badge from him. "You touch me, that a federal offence."

I chose this moment to cut in with a snarky remark of my own. "Oh yeah? And what about kidnapping, arrest without reasonable suspicion, and entering without a warrant? Are those all ok? I mean, I know little about law, but I've seen my share of movies and crime TV shows to know that you need a warrant to just walk into someone's house and take their things; otherwise it's vandalism." Or something like that; in all honesty, I'm not sure about any of that, but I know that it wasn't something that the judge would approve of.

"Yeah, what Raven said. And by the way, I can do whatever I want; I have a 'do-whatever-you-want-and-get-away-with-it-badge," Sam teases, holding the badge in Simmons' face.

"Here, give me that," I say, holding my hand out to the badge.

"What…?" he trails off, handing me tha badge with a confused face. I give a thanking smile, taking the badge from him and hold it in my open palm, hovering my phone over it and take a picture, sticking it in the 'search bar', so to speak, looking for a match. If this thing is real, it'll get me results in a minute. If it isn't real… do the math.

"Where is Sector Seven?" Sam asks.

"Wouldn't you like to know?" Simmons snaps back. Sam goes to bark something at him, but I hold a hand up, cutting him off. "Sam, let it go; _he_ won't tell you anything," I say, emphasizing 'he' to let Sam know that he'll have his answers, just not from the agent.

I go back to my phone, feeling Simmons looking at me. "Hey, Montague, what are you doing?" He questions demandingly. I chose to ignore him, knowing that if I open my mouth, I'll regret every word that comes out of it later. But my need to fire something back at him is tainted when I look up to see Bumblebee flick open something at his… crotch, and hit Simmons in the head with what looked to be a paper cup… and a moment later, Simmons was being covered with what I assume what Bee's equivalent of pee. I bite back a laugh, but allow a humored chuckle, feeling satisfied as I switch screens on my phone and aim a camera at the scene, taking a picture to last forever. And since Bee ended up in the picture, I tuck the newly acquired blackmail material into the "space-balls" folder.

I smirk as my phone beeps, telling me it got results, but I ignore it for the moment, focusing on the short-lived performance. Pity that Optimus Prime decided that this was enough and scolded Bee, ordering him to "stop lubricating the man". I bite the inside of my cheek, loving what I just saw, and hating that it ended so fast, and hating it even more that I will never see it done to Trent and his jerk sidekicks. I guess I'll have to engage my imagination on this one.

"Raven what are you doing?" Sam asks, trying to take a peek at me screen. I hold the phone to my chest, though, hiding it from view.

"No, Sam; not now; we need to know something, and I, for one, am really good at getting what I want," is all I tell him before going back to my search.

I check on my phone, bringing up the files it found, and do a quick scan, finding some interesting things. I let Sam handcuff the guys to each other after a few more failed attempts at getting them to talk, reading over what I found. As it turns out, this 'Sector Seven' and a science research facility, focusing on the engineering and development of machinery, electronics, and security systems – on a Pentagon security level – and other things (after all, I'm only scanning over this, not reading the entire thing - reading the whole thing would take weeks) using something they call NBE-1 and NBE-2. I don't know what NBE stands for, but I'll figure it out later.

As Sam cuffs them to each other, I do a quick scan of something, knowing that had I been in their position, I'd do the same thing. Heck, I'd already done it before. While my phone is doing the job, I watch in amusement as Keala orders Simmons out of his clothes. I hold back a laugh at his expression.

"For _what_?" he protest in utter shock, mouth hanging open in disbelief.

Keala folds her arms over her chest, shifting her weight. "For threatening my dad," she tells him ain a very matter-of-fact, hard tone. I mentally applaud her, smiling to myself at her endless guts. Simmons groans, reluctantly obeying her orders, and starts taking his clothes off, mumbling in anger as he does so.

"Little lady… this… is the beginning of the end of your life…" he tells her, taking off his shot to reveal a Superman-styled S-7. I raise my eyebrows, 'admiring' his attire. Just then, my phone beeps again, and I grin, mentally giving credit to whomever it was who thought of it. Took me a while to figure that one out myself. I check my phone, finding that someone is making a call. I pinpoint the origin to here, enlarging the map, changing to a satellite image in the real time – I think that how you say it – and pinpoint the guy next to Simmons.

"Hey, you," I say, walking over to the half-bald guy from before. "Show me your hands," I order. He does so, showing me two empty hands. I dig into his pockets, digging out his phone, finding it on speaker. I smirk, giving an approving nod. "Not bad," I applaud, and instantly feel every pair of eyes on me. "It's on speaker; we were heard," I inform. From behind me, I hear Sam mutter. "Raven, whatever you did, you're the best." I mentally thank him for that, feeling good about myself, but at the same time extremely self-cautious.

"Not bad yourself; found Sector Seven yet?" Simmons asks.

I look at him, smiling proudly. I look at my screen, pinpointing the destination of the call to be Hoover Dam. "Actually, yes; you should really secure your calls; maybe bounce then off a few satellites," I suggest, looking him square in the eye. But under everyone else's watchful gaze, I feel very uncomfortable, and find my human barricade, being Sam, once again, quickly as I can.

But Simmons stops me. "Knew there was a reason we wanted you in." I turn to him, completely confused. "You keep saying that all night; what are you talking about?"

"Well, only about that you're computer abilities are quite outstanding for your age. We need people with you skills. And you just so happened to make the top of the candidate list in the beginning of the year."

"What are you talking about?" I demand, not putting two and two together just yet.

"Aw come on, and here I thought you were bright. What with your success in the country-wide Advanced Computer Science Olympics last year, and the fact that the teacher didn't even bother to call in for a substitute this year; just asked you to fill in, I thought you'd have it figured out long ago."

"Mr. Henrick had an accident and asked me to teach the class," I mumble to myself.

"Exactly; and why did he do that?" Simmons presses on.

"Because according to him, I'm the best student he ever taught. He deemed my knowledge enough to teach the class," I tell him. And then it hit me: my ACS teacher said I was really good – the best, in fact. That class was the one and only class where my grades were good. And they weren't just good, they were perfect. I was never late or absent, not once, and I was exceeding expectation as everything I did.

I invented a program for the FBI that allows them to hack into any and every cameral in the world – cell phones, ATM's, dashboard cameras, etc. – and do a facial recognition, finding an match over fifty percent, and cross reference it on its own with any other image. I did that two years ago. And that's just the stuff I allowed myself to share without drawing _too_ much suspicion. I have a dozen computer programs – super viruses, tracking and tracing programs for any and every signal and wavelength. I wasn't just good; I was the best of the people of, and around my age. I just found a top secret organization from my phone, in less than five minutes – and it was hidden behind at least a dozen firewalls, which I broke through using a system that I came up with.

"Are you saying that…?" I trail off, staring at the man.

"Took you long enough. Guess I overestimated you," Simmons tells me with a shrug.

"NO!" I shout in protest, desperate to show him that I really was as good he heard. "I mean, I didn't think that I would actually be… I wasn't expecting that someone…" I stumble over my words in attempt to get the right words out. Keala takes the chance to cuff a protesting Simmons to a street light.

"Raven, what are you two talking about?" Sam asks me, giving me a confused look.

I go to answer him, but the sound that I recognize from hundreds of movies and identify as helicopter blades breaks us up and all attention is turned to the highway. Looks like when I found S-7, S-7 found us.

"Optimus, we got company!" Jazz calls out, rounding us all our attention, while Simmons continues talking to me.

"This isn't looking very good for you, Montague. You're grade ten screwed you over quite a bit. Sticking with those things isn't winning you any favors with us," he warns, catching my undivided attention.

"You're telling me that you'll overlook your offer?"

"It's not an offer, so much as it is a possibility. You go with those things, and you can kiss that chance you have goodbye," he tells me, casting me a glare.

"So you're saying that if I help the _Autobots_ – 'those things' have a name, you know – you'll go back on whatever chance I had at getting in?" I needed it. Boy did I ever need it. They were saying that I was at the top of the recruit list. Me, the girl who failed grade ten! I had a job offer before I even graduated. I felt my heart stop for a moment at the full realization.

"So what do you want me to do? Let you go? Turn my back on my best friend? What are you, blackmailing me?" I know that that wasn't blackmail, but it was a threat nonetheless. "That's just low," I hiss at him, glaring. I turn to Sam, who is standing next to me, searching his eyes. He heard the conversation; he understood what was going on. He knew full well what was on my mind, and he was shaking his head.

"Raven… you can't," he tells me in a low voice. _You can't go with them_. In his eyes, I see what he isn't saying, and it tears me apart. _We need you now_. But this was an offer at a stable job; a chance to work someplace that, by the looks of it, is really good. I can have a job. I can have a _good_ job. I was _wanted_ somewhere.

"Raven please," Sam urges, pulling at my arm, "can we not do this, we need to go!"

"Sam, I-"

"Raven, we gotta go!" Sam shouts, dragging me away. I stare after the lineup of black suits, standing with their writs to each other. I want to tell Sam that he has no idea how much it means to me, I want to tell him that he doesn't know anything. I want to shove him off me and get away, because by going with him right now, I'm losing the opportunity of a lifetime, that I barely had, apparently, given my grade ten marks. But the single thought of not going with Sam blinds me to everything else. Go without Sam? Leave Sam to take all the glory and adventure? Awe hell no! Besides, someone needs to make sure he doesn't get himself into too much trouble.

After all, friends will bail you out of jail while best friends will be behinds bars with you, telling you, "That was fun! Let's do that again!" I smirk at the thought, my mind being made for me and I twist my arm out of Sam's gold, my hand finding his and I let him drag me, the much slower runner, after him to the Autobot leader, who offers a hand. We climb on, and he lifts us to his shoulder, where we secure ourselves, making sure we hold on so we don't fall. I cast him and Keala a cautious glance, panicking as I realize just how high I am above the ground.

"Just don't look down," Sam tells me, his tone teasing, as he knows that telling someone to not look down inevitably leads them to looking down. And look down is exactly what I do, and then proceed to smacking him in the back of the head. Optimus Prime tells his comrades to move out.

The leader starts running, trying to avoid being seen by the helicopters – a task which proves to be difficult, given his size. Unable to hide, he takes to the open road, and I mentally give him extra points for his ability to run so fast, yet somehow manage to avoided all the cars and people. I, personally, was always terrible at hop-scotch and that dancing carpet thing, so this amazed me quite a bit.

He darts under a bridge, hoisting himself up as the helicopters fly by underneath us. I hold my breath, closing my eyes, my entire frame shaking so badly that next to me, Sam feels it and wraps a reassuring arm around me, giving me a somewhat confident nudge. I turn to him, my eyes still shut tightly, and manage a small, terrified smile, as I hear the chopper blades right beneath me, so close, and fast.

In this instant I decide that I hate blander and fans and basically anything that rotates some form of blades, my mind filling with less than pleasant, graphic images from horror films with torture scenes Sam and I were stupid enough to watch.

Easy, children," Optimus Prime tells us as the helicopters pass and the noise from them lessens. Only then it gets louder again, and I suspect that they are coming back. Oh no, they found us; they found us and they're back coming for us. I let out a shaking breath, finding some metal thing to hold on to for dear life as the loud buzzing sound goes right under us again.

My eyes fly open when Optimus Prime's body jerks downwards, the falling sensation sending adrenaline pumping through my body at a hundred mile an hour. I scream, hearing it being echoed by another girl. That's when I find Keala falling forward, losing her grip and plummeting to the ground. It happens so fast that I don't even realize what's happening until she's holding onto Sam's hand for her life as a chopper flies under her. Sam is holding on to a part of Optimus Prime's shoulder literally with his fingertips, and the only thought sends my hand flying, reaching out for Sam as he and the girls holding onto him both scream.

"I got you Sam!" I shout, grabbing his hand with mine, the new weight instantly sending an electric current of pain up my arm as his fingers slip. "I'm holding you, I got you! Oh who am I kidding?! No I don't got you! Sam, you're slipping! Holding on to me, you idiot!"

"Raven, don't let go if me!" he pleads desperately as his hand slips from mine, his fingers clawing at me and vice versa. "Don't drop me; if you do, I'll kill you!"

"What have you been eating, you pig?! You're slipping!" I scream, leaning down as far as I can go. And that was my mistake because the next moment I feel an awful pain in my right shoulder as Sam slips from my hand and I give a failed attempt to catch my balance. The next second, we all go plummeting to the hard ground below.

I see Optimus Prime try to catch us, but we miss him and from all the movies and books, I know that we will die. Pancake on the pavement; not a very pleasant way to die at all. If I had to choose how to die, I'd probably want to die in my sleep because it's the most painless way to die. Wait… did I just really prefer one way to die over the other? That's sad.

I close my eyes, readying myself for the deadly impact. And I wait… and I wait… and I wait. And it never comes. Instead I feel metal being securely wrapped around me like a protective vest, and all I know is that my trajectory changes within a second. I'm jerked to the side violently, my whole weight slamming onto one side painfully, and then the sound of metal screeching against the cement.

When I open my eye – too weak to do anything but that – I see a familiar face and glowing blue eyes. But I'm far too dazed and shaking to fully recognize the world around me, and everything is a messy blur of color and sound and movement, and I can't make myself move an inch on my own. I feel myself being moved and shoved, but my world only comes to focus when I find my hands, once again, pinned behind me.

In the confusion of the situation, I start panicking, and begin thrashing and screaming at the top of my lungs. "No, let go of me! You can't touch me; get your hands _off me_! It takes me what feels like an eternity to realize what's going on, and that Sector Seven found us, and we were in their hands again, literally.

I stop freeing out, letting the three officers subdue me, and pin me to the concrete. In the commotion, I find Sam breaking free from his captive, and run to Bumblebee, who saved our lives what felt like a lifetime ago, thanks to my dazed out state. The said Autobot is also on the ground, tide down, and being covered with something that I'm guessing is dry ice of something. Sam gives a desperate attempt at helping his guardian as he is frozen.

Though I know nothing about the Bot other than his name, watching him being hurt like that hurt me as well. They were hurting him, when all he was doing is saving us, and trying to save his own world. "Stop!" I cry out. "Stop, you're hurting him!" It's useless, and I barely hear myself over the roar of the crowd and figure that no one else heard me either, but I keep uselessly shouting for them to stop hurting Bumblebee because he did nothing wrong – because shout is all I can do.

But they tackle Sam, and he's captive again, and I'm jerked off the ground and taken away, my eyes glued to the innocent Autobot who has all but give up fighting and lets out a defeated, broken, hurt noise, which is all that his… vocal processors, if I remember right, will allow. I consider struggling to get free, but realize that it's just stupid, and even if my tiny, five-foot-five self managed to do that, I'd have nothing to do but wait a fraction of a second before the catch up to me.

So I let myself be stuffed into the back of yet another black van, and the doors close, leaving the three of us, plus a guard, all alone, and the car starts moving. And selfish as it is, the only thing going through my mind is that I just lost a job opportunity. I was at the top of the recruit list, barely hanging, thanks to my failing my tenth grade, and now I was off it entirely.

I lost an opportunity for a job.


	9. Chapter 9

**AN:**

**1)**. **krikanalo**: Thank you! I was having a little trouble with this particular chapter because of the scene and setting. Since I want to keep this as close to the canon as possible without pushing Raven out of the story entirely, I had to come up with something for her to do while the others were busy interrogating and humiliating Simmons. So I'm really glad I have succeeded in doing so.

** penny . bear. 37**: (it won't let me put your name up without a space because it thinks that it's a URL) Thank you! I'm glad you like it so much! One of the most important things in this particular chapter – was also my favorite – is that struggle she has in the end, when Simmons tells her that she could have a future as worker for S-7, unlike every other story I read when there is an OC in the movie, she actually listens to him. He tells her she can have a job and suddenly her friends and aliens are not on her list of important things in the world. Because that girl in waist-deep in bills and the promise of a job is enough to turn her point of view on the whole thing backwards.

Almost every movie re-telling with an OC has always been helping, or single-handedly saving the world, but we all know that Raven isn't like that. This isn't about the movie and the battle so much as it is about Raven growing as a person; becoming stronger and better as a person, not about saving the world (no, I totally don't have a problem with that, because a lot of those kinds of stories are brilliant, but I want to take a different path). So when people come to her, offering her money, she _is_ gonna take that opportunity. That's one of the things I love about her so much: unlike most OCs I've read about, _she is corruptible_.

** Marauder Heir**: You are correct! It's actually one of my favorite episodes, and the quote is one on my favorites in the entire series. It's nice to another Doctor Who watcher reading this. High five! And thank you for loving the story! Here is some more for you.

**More AN (sorry it's so long, but it's important**: I love so much that my readers are as wonderful as you guys are! Thank you so much for sticking with this story! Also, **THIS IS IMPORTANT**: in the van, Raven never ONCE thought about what they did to Bumblebee. She isn't a cold person as much as she is… indifferent. She's grateful that Bee saved her life, but she has enough on her plate as it is. It's an important part of her character! BUT FEAR NOT! I have a really cute scene to make up for that!

**Oh and, this chapter is switching between Sam's and Raven's POV, so every time there is a line-break, in means change in POV, not change in scene.**

Anyway, now that that's done; I don't own transformers, and enjoy:

* * *

Sam Witwicky always liked to think of himself as a rather patient person. Not to say he was very forgiving, but even when he was bullied, he waited until the last possible moment to snap; always giving those who bullied him more time to realize that their words were not hurting him as much as they would have hopped. He has long since learned that they will always try to get to him, so he simply got used to blocking everything they'd say and do out, ignoring the majority.

But even his seemingly near-endless willingness to give more time ended before it could begin when the people who were close to him were being hurt. If he was messed with, he was mature enough to take care of it in his own way; but when someone lays a hand on his loved ones, he would not have a second of it.

That's why he couldn't watch his guardian, whom he had know for barely an hour, getting hurt. Little as he may know of the yellow Bot, he had saved their lives multiple times over the course of a single night, and on top of that – as though it wasn't enough – he did nothing wrong but try to protect him and his friends. He was innocent, and he was getting hurt. It was not something he could just allow to happen. He had to at least _try_ to save his friend. Deep inside he knew he wouldn't make much of a difference, but at least when it all came down to it, he knew that he gave his best.

But Bumblebee and Raven are two very different… people, for the lack of a better word. That's why when Sam saw Raven thrashing and screaming for them to stop hurting the boy's guardian, it took every ounce of his resistance, which he had been collecting 'for a rainy day' for the past seven years, to stop himself from beating the men holding him up, and run to her aid, doing the same to the men who were mishandling her. It was all he could do to stop himself.

And the only reason he did so was because of all the things she was shouting, not a single word was a plea to be let go. She asked for no help, and as memory served – and that particular memory was rather vivid – helping her when she didn't ask was not something he was too inclined to do. Still, seeing her struggle against the firm hold of the men enraged him more than he ever remembered being. It infuriated him to no end to see them hurt her like that, holing her with absolutely no regard to that they were hurting her.

Later, when they'd all been pushed inside yet another black van, and taken elsewhere, Sam turned to her, barely containing himself at the man setting across from them, but unloaded and lazily laying on the seat next to its owner. He saw no marks of bruising or any other external form of injury, but it did nothing to his anger.

"Are you alright? Did they hurt you?" the young boy hurried to ask, not calling her on it when she nodded too quickly, and said "Yeah, I'm good? Are... Are you alright? They beat you up pretty badly back there; how are you?" He'd never call out on her lies, even though, unbeknown to her, he'd long since learned to see right through her; and he didn't need a cold running down his spine to know when Raven was lying.

No, he'd never admit to seeing past her strong and joyous façade of someone tough and happy; he's known her for far too long to be fooled by her make-believe anymore.

* * *

Sam nods, confirming that he's fine, and I look to Mikaela, sitting on the other side of me, the same question in my eyes. She gives a small nod, and with that, we go silent, all engrossed in our own thoughts. I look down at my knees, the whole of tonight slowly working its way into my brain, leaving itself loud and clear in my memory.

And of all the things that had happened today – waking up at Sam's place, paying the bills, following Sam's car as it chases him, Sam getting attacked by the monster, Bumblebee saving us, the small monster, the introduction, the car ride, the asteroids, the Autobots, the glasses, getting kidnapped by officials, a job offer, and almost dying. And of all those things, the only thing bright in my memory is the look Simmons gave me as I was pushed into this van.

I could have had a job once out of high school; a stable, visibly highly-paid job, at a top secret base and by this point I didn't even care what I'd be doing! They took the time to seek _me_ out. They found out about my computer skills, and they were interested; interested enough to put me at the top of their recruit list, even with the fact that I didn't pass grade ten! I had a chance at a job which sought _me_ out, and not the other way around! I could have gotten it!

Suddenly I'm angry.

I could have had a job, had Sam not decided that apparently he needed my help to give a shitty pair of glasses that are older than Jesus to some alien freaks! What does he know about working? What does he know about struggling to pull two ends together and doing clothes shopping in second-hand stores and trying to get something for breakfast other than cereal? I'm sick of cereal; if I have to eat cereal for breakfast one more time, I'm gonna puke! What does he know? He doesn't know anything. I needed that job offer, and in one year, I could have had it!

He goes around pretending that here is no world outside of getting a girlfriend and selling crappy glasses on eBay. Those useless glasses almost killed the lot of us!

I bite the inside of my cheek, struggling against the threat of tears. No… I would give it to him in spades, exactly what he did wrong and exactly how much I couldn't care less about some aliens who want a pair of rusty old glasses that belonged to a crazy dude! No one cares about some other race's problems! I have too much of my own to care about some metal giants!

* * *

"You know…" Raven says in a sad, hysterical laugh of desperation. "… For this one… this one crazy, ridiculous moment, I actually thought that I had a future outside of a part time in Burger King and KFC, with a night shift at Denies.". She keeps shaking her head, the action becoming more and more infuriated. From her state, Sam knew exactly what's to come, and knew exactly how much it's about to hurt him, even though it never meant anything.

_Only it sure doesn't feel like nothing_, the boy thought to himself, pursing his lips.

"It's all your fault," Raven murmured, almost too quiet for Sam to hear. "It's your fault," she said again, this time louder. Finally whatever barrier was holding her back broke down and the exploded. "It's your fault, Sam! What's _problem_, huh?! Can't you do anything on your own? What are you, some sort of child who needs babysitting in everything he does? What could possibly so important that you had drag me along?!" she shouted, so loudly that Sam moved back, watching her closely, worry setting in as it always did when she was angry or upset. She was unpredictable when something upset her, to the point where she could hurt herself or someone else.

"Do you need me to tag along with you in everything you do?! No, of course you couldn't leave me alone; you had to have me on your heels like I'm some sort of lost puppy! Well guess what, I'm not. You can't bring me along with you every time you feel like having company. Why don't you just sleep with the love of your life over here; little Miss Perfect with her sad eyes and her tragic childhood and her obsession over cars. I'm sure she'd be much better company that old Raven," she snapped at the boy's face, his expression changing from shock to hurt, to concern. Behind her, Mikaela's eyes were winder than she ever remembered them being.

Sure the two were never friends, seeing as Raven's only actual friend was Sam, but Raven was one of the quietest, most patient and accepting people she ever knew. She took the picking and the being hit on very quietly, with her head bowed, staring at the ground and laughing awkwardly before walking away.

This Raven, though… Mikaela wasn't sure whether to be worried, or insulted. 'Little Miss Perfect'? That was by far one of the most hurtful things she ever head in all her life. Yes, she wasn't ever treated with the utmost respect, and there was always those separate few who were really nasty in their remarks and criticism, but the dark haired teen would have never imagined something like that coming from someone as nice as Raven.

"I have a news flash for you: the world doesn't revolve around you and what you want and think is important, Samuel; there are things you want to do, and then there are things that _need_ to be done. I have my own problems to handle, FYI; I don't need yours to deal with as well. And if some bunch or creepy aliens say they need your freak grandpa's glasses, then you don't need me."

She kept blaming him, getting it all out of her system. And Sam sat still, watching her intently, waiting for her to say everything there was to say, shooting their guard several warning glances to tell him to let her shout it all out. Someone knocked from the front of the car, ordering for them to be quiet. To that, Raven had a rather unintelligible answer, which caused Sam to take a moment to wonder where she picked up.

He let her say it all and more, taking all her anger out in her own way. She was not usually like that, Sam thought, even when she got angry. She was always more tame when it came to taking her anger out at something. She was upset… much more than he'd ever seen her be.

With everything on her mind spoken – or rather, shouted – she slumped lazily back on the bench along the side of the car, breathing heavily. Sam looked at her, not taking his eyes off the girl. This was one of those time in which he wished more than anything that he could read her mind. If only he knew what she was thinking, if only he could understand… if only he could _help_. God knew it was all he wanted.

"Sir?" she suddenly asked, after a long silence, intensely focused on her thoughts. "Can… can you unlock the cuffs?" Her voice shook as she tried not to let her despair get the best of her. "I just wanna go to sleep."

* * *

With all of us free, I return to my spot between Sam and Keala, shaking a little from the speech I just gave, my anger dying down.

"Hey…" Sam starts, placing a gentle hand on my shoulder, "come here." I shift over, trying to lay down and Keala moves away to make room. After a while of shoving and wincing and grunting, we finally agree that the arrangement is not working and Keala gets off the bench, instead taking a seat next to the guard to leave this bench to Sam and me. I manage to lay down, my side hurting from lying on the metal seat. I put my head on Sam's lap, his arms protectively around my shoulder. I close my eyes, trying to catch my breath.

"Thanks for offering. And… Sam I'm… I'm so sorry about what I said. You know I didn't mean any of those things."

"No, you don't need to apologize. I have my ways of dealing with anger; you have yours; end of story. Besides, it's not the first time you burst out like that; I think I can handle myself."

I snort, a soft chuckle rocking my body. "Yeah right; we both know I can take you when I'm angry. I'm like the Incredible Hulk: the angrier I get that more undefeatable I am." This gets that very much needed laugh from Sam, and I instantly smile at the sound of his laughter.

"Yeah… but you're _my_ Incredible Hulk; and you aren't going anywhere." I smile again, my eyes open this time.

"Mikaela… I'm… I don't know what came over me. I'm not like that, I swear. It just got out and-"

"-Hey," she cuts me off, "I'm a big girl; if I felt intimidated by you, I could take care of myself. And it's not like I never said things I regretted saying later. It happens," she tells me with a shrug.

"So you forgive me?"

"Yes, I forgive you; although really, I didn't have much to blame you for. We all freak out every now and then." I don't get the chills and know she's telling the truth. Oh it's a good thing I'm a walking lie detector, otherwise my insecurity would be bugging her for a very, _very_ long time.

We stay silent for a while, the only sound being the murmuring in the front of the car, the driver and passenger conversing with each other, the sound of rotating tires on the road and our breathing. All that combined was lulling me to sleep. Too bad that I felt like my breakfast was about to escape; couldn't the car travel smoother? At least then I wouldn't feel that we were moving and the urge to throw up would go away. In my head, I repeat a sort of mantra, telling myself that that car wasn't moving, and that I wasn't in the back of a van with no windows to look out- it usually helps with the 'don't throw up' part.

"Look who developed a new habit," Sam suddenly says, startling me a little. I turn my head a little, looking at him from the corner of my eye.

"What habit?"

"You can't seem to be able to fall asleep unless you twist that particular strand of your hair; you tuck your hair behind your ear and twist it, but only the right side," he says in amusement. I look down at my hand to see what he is saying is true: a strand of my hair tucked behind my ear and twisted around my index finger.

For a moment, I have to wonder when Sam had the chance to notice that it's a habit. Just then, Sam gives a heartly laugh, he body shaking from it and doing the same to me. I shoot him a glare. "Oh what so now my having a habit is suddenly funny?"

"What; no," Sam assures me, shaking his head, no. "Although it is kind of cute to watch you spin a strand of hair around your finger, trying to go to sleep. No, I was actually remembering the day we met.

This catches me by surprise. "Oh," is all I get out. I think about that day on occasion, wondering how my life would have turned out had it all been different. So many possibilities there, the top one being: what would happen if the teacher was far too engrossed by the other kids, that she didn't notice me leave.

"Yeah; you were so defensive that day, with your arms crossed over your chest protectively, instantly fighting off any attention you might be given. You were so closed up and self cautious, and very, _very_ red." A smile bloomed on his face as his eyes glazed over with memory.

"I was standing in the doorway, trying to decide on whether to enter or leave. I chose to leave, and did just that," I say, deep in memory, the first day playing before my eyes as we speak.

"The teacher went to get you, and sat you down in the seat next to me."

"And you were afraid to smile. But I was too cleaver for you, and you did smile in the end. You showed me you missing tooth by accident."

"And you felt bad for me, and showed me yours."

"And you smiled, because now you weren't the only one without your front teeth."

"You offered me a chocolate."

"And you said "let's be friends"."

* * *

The memory, in unison, nearly broke them both; the teen sitting on the metal bench, and the one laying her head on his lap, subconsciously twisting her hair as she traced small circles on the boy's knee, not at all aware of her actions. Sam, though, noticed. He noticed every little detail; he always had.

She was so small, he thought, so fragile and breakable, hiding behind a wall of strength. But beneath it, she was so broken and exhausted, life itself eating away whatever was left of her strength. He saw the way she stirred in fear at night, and heard the way her laugh was so well masked as real. She was in pain; she was hurting and he didn't know what made her like that. She was wasted and tired, and she fooled everyone, putting on a mask of happiness and laughter. She tried to so hard to never let anyone in; to not let anyone see just how delicate she really was, a single wrong look sending her spirit into a cry for help.

A cry she would not let anyone hear.

But sometimes… sometimes her barriers fell. It happened once, as Sam very clearly recalled, and of all the times she managed to reach in and touch his heard, that was the most vivid.

**Four years ago**

_A clap of thunder jerked a small boy awake, heart racing, breathing heavy. It's only a storm, he had to remind himself once again, settling back into bed, only to be startled by yet another rip of lightning, followed by an even louder boom, disturbing the night. The night was far from peaceful and rare in their parts, the weather usually being warm and sunny. Sam huddled down in his blankets, peaking out at his room, full of shadow from the flashes of light._

_His parents left for the night, and he didn't know when they'd be back. He may have been thirteen, but Sam was scared. Another flash set his room alight, creating clawed hands on his walls, and another clap of thunder._

_Still, it wasn't loud enough to drown out the knocking, which has been going on nonstop for at least fifteen minutes. Ron and Judy had told him to not answer the door, but the small boy couldn't help but felt sorry for whoever was standing outside in the storm, looking for a place to stay the night._

_Reluctantly, he gathered up his blanket, reaching for the flashlight on his bedside table, and flicked in on, wrapping himself in the blanket. As thunder sounded outside, Sam jumped right back into bed with a screech. But the thought of someone standing outside overpowered the fear. He was scared, but what if that person was even more scared. After debating for a long while, he finally made his choice. Slowly, he got up, walking down the stairs to the front door, flashlight in hand, and unlocked it, pulling it open._

_And the flashlight dropped from his hand at whom he saw standing socked to the bone and shivering at his doorstep._

_"Raven!" he exclaimed, his hands flying to her mouth. Under the rain, dripping down her hair and onto her face in steady streams, he saw something he saw very rarely: she was crying._

_"Please don't send me away," she whimpered, her voice shaking from cold and fear. Without hesitating for a second, Sam reached for her hand, pulling her into the house and locking the door behind him. The moment she was in the house, the young girl collapsed on the floor, shaking like an autumn leaf in the wind._

_"Raven what are you doing here?"_

_"I'm… I'm s-sorry…" she got out, stumbling over the words from cold. "I w-was… I was sc-scared. M-My mom an-an-and dad aren't home-e. I'm… I'm so-sorry." Sam pulled his blanket off himself, wrapping it around the shaking girl, and ran a gentle hand over her back, calming her._

_"It's ok," Sam told her, trying to comfort her. "Here, come here," he said, sitting down next o her, leaning on the wall and holding his arms out for her. Hesitating for a little, Raven went in them, huddling close to him, making his Spiderman pajamas and hair wet. "There you go… see; all better."_

_Slowly, Raven stopped shaking, her clothes still wet, as well as the blanket, both children sitting in a puddle on the floor. But neither cared. They sat in each other's arms, the boy squeaking every time thunder ripped through the night._

_"Little child… be not afraid…" Raven's voice shook as she rested her head on Sam's shoulder. "The rain pounds harsh against the glass… like an unwanted stranger… there is no danger…" she mumbled shakily, the musical note gone from her voice, a lot of time passing between every time she spoke. "… I am here tonight…"_

**Back to present**

She sounded so broken, so weak and hurt and afraid when she pleaded Sam to not send here away. Looking back at that night now, he realized how wrong and horrible it sounded that she didn't ask him to stay the night; no, she asked to not be sent away… to not be turned away from.

And still, even in her most sensitive state, she still found Sam's fear unacceptable. She sang to him, just as Judy did when it was storming. She still was trying to make him feel better.

As Raven was deep in thought, tiredness taking over and pulling her under, her head resting on his lap, his fingers brushing through her brown hair, he didn't notice that tears running down his face. What he did notice were the tears running down his Raven's face. She was crying. Crying as she fell asleep. _No_, Sam thought, _she can't cry herself to sleep_. He had a gut feeling that she's been doing that all too long. No, she wouldn't be crying, not if he can't help it. She might not be able to help her, but that wouldn't stop him from trying. All he wished is that she would open up to him; trust him enough to tell him the truth. If only she felt secure enough with telling him the whole truth. But he knew better than to push her. She'd open up to him when she trusted him enough. Maybe…

No… no 'maybe', Sam thought, finding the answer to why she would never speak of her home life. Her house was never to be seen, her parents an off-limits topic and anything that got too close to her home was instantly rejected, the subject changing in that very moment; and with the memory of that stormy night and what she'd begged of him, he knew he had his answer: she was afraid of being left – she didn't trust Sam enough to stay with her to tell him.

He couldn't convince her with words… but maybe he could show her.

* * *

"Little child… be not afraid… the rain pounds against the glass… like an unwanted… stranger… there is no… danger…" It was awfully off-key and poorly tuned, but I would recognize the words no matter how bad they sounded, coming from Sam – who was really not a good singer. He knew it, and he still sang, and I still listened, my heart pounding in my chest as that night comes back to me. "I am here… tonight." The tears in my eyes steadied from singer droplets to a stream, my hand curling into a tight fist and my throat thickening. "Little child… be not afraid… the lightning and lightning flash… illuminates… you tearstained face… I am here tonight. And some day you'll know… that nature is so… this same rain that draw you… near me… falls on rivers and land… on forests and sand… makes the beautiful world that you see… in the morning."

Four years ago, it was nothing but a lullaby – a small attempt to calm Sam's fear of storms. But now, coming from Sam… it meant something completely different.

'… Makes the beautiful world that you see… in the morning'.

How it was, I didn't know, but somehow… somehow he knew; he knew my struggle, and he knew it was draining me. And still, he believed that things will get better.

I start softly sobbing, my body shaking as I do. Sam's hold on me tightens protectively. With him there, holding my close, keeping me from harm and a weak moment… I feel so safe; so in place… where I belong. The sobbing goes down, the tears once again silent, and even now I smile, my hand finding his, and I hold it tightly, keeping him where he is, a part of me fearing that should I let go, he'll disappear.

* * *

He felt guilty; so very guilty. But there was nothing he could do about it. He couldn't help but feel a little proud. Even now, she was smiling. _He_ made her smile. And it wasn't the smile she gave simply because having to smile all day was more bearable that having to tell people why she cried; no, it was a real true _smile_ – the kind of smile that made her look like an angel, even when she was in tears.

And it was for him; she only ever smiled like that for Sam. He continued to stroke her hair, feeling her breath even slowly, her mind drifting away, her smile still in place. He was the only one who made her truly smile; the only one who was able to drown all her fears and give her that small bit of innocent happiness that she so desperately needed.

And the sense of guilt only grew when he realized who large a part of him wanted her to smile for no one but him. He wanted to be the only one to ever see that smile of hers – he wanted it to be meant for him alone.

"What are we?" the girl laying peacefully on him lap mumbled, barely staying awake now. "What are we to each other? We aren't best friends – we're closer than that. Sam… what am I to you?"

Sam thought very hard over his answer, knowing that one wrong word, and her serenity would be broken – he knew how much she tried to make it as if words didn't hurt her. Only they did, and even more so than ever in the last year.

"To me… Raven, you are… the most amazing person I ever met. And I tried to imagine how my life would turn out if you did manage to get away from class on that first day, and I… I can't imagine how my life would turn out if I hadn't met you," he said, picking his words very carefully.

"What about… Sam, I lost any chance I had at the job – whatever the job was. I… I don't even care what they were offering me; I just needed it. And I was willing to abandon you in order to keep that chance, which wasn't even definite. What does that make me? I was willing to leave you and the Autobots for a _possibility_ at having a job. What kind of person does that make me?" Her voice was thick and hurt and troubled and even ashamed. Yes, she did hesitate to go with him, and she blamed him for taking her away from there.

For this, though, Sam didn't even need to think before the answer came, definite and set. "It makes you a wonderful, brilliant, incredible person. And if they suddenly think that you aren't good enough, in that case they're all idiots, and it's all their loss." And he didn't say it because she needed to hear it – he'd never do that. He said it from the bottom of his heart.

* * *

"Raven…?"

"Huh?"

"What am I to you?"

I give a little thought before answering genuinely. "You're my guardian angel. You saved me, Sam… from myself. Whenever I had doubts, or didn't think I was strong enough to make the right choice… you were always there, pushing me in the right direction. You saved my life… in more ways than one. You were always standing over my shoulder, ready to kick my ass if I did something stupid, and when I didn't listen to you, you scolded me, and then laughed like you were crazy, and then you picked me back up again. You protected me from the worst thing: you protected me from myself… like tonight, when I wanted to stay… you took me with you when I wasn't strong enough to see that I need you more than I do a job – and believe me, I need it, "oh boy did I ever need it. "But you were more important to me, and you helped me see that. You're my guardian angel, Sam, and I am yours, and we will always look after each other, no matter what happens, and no matter what gets in the way."

I take a breath, feeling myself drift off to sleep. But before I let myself go, I had one more thing to say. "As long as you need me, I'll always be there… never let me forget that," because I trusted him enough to help me remember who I really was.

* * *

He played with her hair as she'd finally fallen asleep, hoping more than anything that her dreams were pleasant. Her smile remained, her words fresh in his mind, making Sam restless. She'd be there as long as he needed her, and she trusted him enough to remind her of that.

_As long as I live, Raven, I will always need you. You just remember that._

_I will always need you._

**AN: this chapter was inspired by two songs: the first, for Sam, is She Will BE Loved, by Maroon 5. The second one is for Raven, and it's Arms by Christina Perry.**

**I hope you loved the chapter and if you did, please tell me. Please review!**

**Question of the day: "chevron seven: locked" All you SciFi lovers, where is that from?**

**And I will see yo all very soon. Bye!**


	10. Chapter 10

**AN: thanks to "****koryandrs" and "angel897" for your reviews. But two reviews? Come on, you guys. A chapter from Sam's POV adds a new prospective to the story, and lets us see more of their relationship, and no one had anything to say? You make me sad.**

**This chapter was hard to write, I wrote and re-wrote it a hundred times, so I'm so sorry for taking so long. But you are my readers, and it is my job to give you the best I can.**

**I have a request, my dears. I am NOT holding my story 'hostage' so to speak, waiting for a certain amount of reviews before the next chapter, but can you please make me feel really nice and give me at least four reviews per chapter, either complimenting me, or giving me constructive criticism, or really just anything you think. I take kindly to suggestions and idea, so don't be afraid to volunteer them, or just tell me what you thought in general. Pretty, pretty please!**

**Also, this chapter is a bit of a filler, but it's necessary, it expand on Raven and the kind of person she is.**

**I'm saying it one last time for the rest of the story: I don't own transformers.**

"Raven… Raven wake up…" I hear Sam's voice, distant and barely audible. Someone shakes me a little and I try to reach for their hand to break their wrist. "Raven come on, we need to get out.

_Get lost, Sam, I'm sleeping._

"I know you're sleeping, but you need to get up before they drag you out."

_If you don't leave me alone, I'll beat you up._

"Yeah right, you can't even see me; how are you planning to beat me up, eh?"

_Huh? What? You can hear me? How are you in my mind?_

"I'm not in your mind; you're talking out loud, stupid. Now wake up before they drag you out of here by your arms and legs." I ignore him, groan, and roll over to get more comfortable. "Alright, suit yourself. But I'm warning you that you brought this on yourself."

I scream as he begins tickling me, thrashing and squirming and flailing as I try to slap his hands away from my ribs and neck.

"Ah, n-no, get away f-from m-me! No-o-o- n-not fair! Ok, no, you as-you as-asked for this you little free-ee-eek. I give you one last chance t-to sto-op!" He doesn't, instead tickling my even more. "I'm not responsible for injuries!" I scream as a last-ditch effort to get him to stop. Thankfully, he remembered the last time I said that all too well, and in an instant, his hands – and him all together – are gone and I hear shuffling back away from me. I open my eyes to see Sam stumbling out of the car, an expression of fear on his face.

"Wise choice," I snarl, now fully awake. I rub what's left of sleep from my eyes, scratching at my head as I push myself up and stand up, instantly becoming dizzy. I fall back on the bench, trying to catch my balance, and only get up and out when I trust myself enough to stand on my own two feet.

Sam laughs from outside the van, and I jump out, purposely bumping into him and pushing him back, he falls on his behind, complaining about how it hurt. "Cry-baby," I say with a smirk, and then reach out a hand, which he takes, pulling himself to his feet. "So what's the plan?"

"We're getting into a helicopter and going somewhere else," he says. A helicopter? I look around, seeing the sun just barely up, and groan.

"Argh! It's too early," I complain, grabbing hold of Sam's shoulder and lean on him for support as my body realize how early it is and tries to send me back to sleep. I've never gotten up this early – I've stayed up that late, but never got up before eight thirty… and that's only because I had school and didn't want to be _too_ late.

Lazily, I rub my eyes, trying to get the sleep out, but I'm not very successful. "Come on," Sam tells me, supporting me as we start walking. "Let's go." I crack my eyes open, hiding in the shadow of Sam's head to keep the sun out as we're walking to a helicopter. We get in and a guy in a uniform secures us in place with a million buckles. A headset is placed on our heads, and the mics are turned on. We test them, making sure we hear each other, and then we wait for something to happen, making small chit-chat as well as deep conversation about what happened.

"I can't believe they took him," Sam whispers, referring to Bumblebee. "They just… took him, like he's some sort of stray animal." His voice shakes in anger, hands clenching into fists. "He didn't do anything wrong, and they froze him and dragged him off with no regard to anything," he hisses, his voice shaking. I place a gentle hand on his arm, rubbing my thumb back and forth, trying to sooth him.

"We'll get him back, Sam, I promise you," I say softly, hearing my own voice in my headset from my proximity to his microphone.

"How can you know that? You saw what they did to him back there."

"So what? We'll figure something out. We can bargain or something. And besides, aren't you the bigger optimist of the two of us?" I tease, trying to lighten his mood. "I promised we'd get him back, and I might not be Miss Honesty, but have I ever given you reason to not believe my word?"

"A few times, yeah." My mouth drops open, shock overtaking my face.

"Ah… it's nice to be loved," I joke, knowing full well that yes, in fact, I did several times. I did look him in the eye, and I did tell the outright lie, and yes I did promise him something and not keep my word. "But in the past few years I've been working on that," I say. "I'm not the most truthful person in the world, that's a given, but if I give my word, I make sure to keep it… unless I promise a teacher to bring in an assignment the next day, but that doesn't count," I say, lowering my tone and pointing a mockingly scolding finger at the boy.

"That's right," Mikaela says, joining the conversation. "Education might be important, but school is a different matter altogether. Oh don't look at me like that," she says, rolling her eyes. "My grades aren't up at the top, despite what everyone thinks. I might have a good attendance record, but I hand in about as much work as Raven." I raise my eyebrows and turn around, holding up a hand, which she high-five's.

"By the way," Mikaela says, quite a bit shyly. "I know it's not my business to ask, and you don't have to answer but… what's the matter?" I give her a confused, questioning look and she goes to explain what she means. "Everyone knows that you aren't stupid. I mean… you teach Advanced Computer Science because the teacher can't make it, and you're the teacher's assistant/substitute for Computer Programming. So why are the rest of your classes… you know… not very good…?" she allows. I resist the urge to spit a snarky comment about how she's the one who slept with the entire football team, and has no right to speak to me that way.

"Ok, first of all, you're right: it is none of your business. But second of all: I'm just too lazy to get any work done. I like computer class, that's why I try; I don't care about the rest. It's not like I'll be needing physics to clean tables in KFC," I say with a shrug.

"Well… yeah but… you aren't going to be working at KFC for the rest of your life; you were in the computer programming Olympics last year."

"I know… and your point is…?"

"That you won second place for example? Didn't you get a scholarship or something?"

"Yes, Mikaela, I did get a scholarship, but it's worth jacks-squad if I don't get into college, and let's face it; I won't even show up for the final exam, so I have no hope there."

"Why do you do that?" she asks, half softly, and half annoyed to the beyond. "I mean come on; no girl who _teaches a class_, and substitutes slash assists with another – both of which are advanced – and a girl who goes to a country-wide Olympics and wins a silver at age seventeen can't honestly want nothing else in life. Why do you do this to yourself? Look at you; you have a future _full_ of great possibilities with your skill set."

I want to snap at her, tell her to shut up and mind her own business because she has no idea what's she's saying. I already opened my mouth to bitch it all out at her, but then I snap it shut loudly, going a little red in the face as I realize something; Mikaela is right. No one is doing this to me but me. Looking back at it, it all began when I suddenly decided I was all grown up and knew better. Only I knew jack about squad, and it was my stuck-up-ness that brought me here in the first place. If I tried giving a damn about school, I could do really well, and choose a course out of over a dozen options that I could have. I could go into film animation, computer coding; hell, with the right University degree, I could go into _Google_! I could do so much, but I chose not to. I chose to live by "why do it now when you can do it later?" and it's taking me down a deep, _deep_ hole; only out of which I'm afraid I won't be able to climb out of if I go falling any longer.

Problem is, I know myself too well. I know that even with this new realization, I won't change my ways. So instead of snapping at the raven-haired girl, I turn to her and give her an embarrassingly true answer; "I don't have the willpower to change it."

"Then why don't you ask for help?" Because I'm too ashamed to ask for anything. Because I did this to myself, and it's up to me to fix it all. Because it's the mess I created – the mess of _my_ life – and it's up to _me_ to choose to take care of it or not, and it's my fault and mine _alone_ that I can't… pardon the lie; that I _don't want to_. I know for fact that I have the ability and persistence to get myself out of this, but that the heart of the problem isn't what I can or cannot do; it's what I _want_ or _don't want_ to do.

But I don't say any of that. I just shrug and shake my head. "I don't know," I tell her. "I just don't." Mikaela doesn't get to retort because just then, another couple of people are brought into the helicopter and they go through the same procedure we went through – getting strapped in nice and tight until they can't breathe. Through the headset, I hear them both breathing heavily, like they just ran a great distance.

The blades of the helicopter start up not a minute late, and I grip the seat under me, actually grateful that I was strapped in to the point of suffocation when I feel the ground beneath us disappear. I'm not afraid of heights, but I don't trust anything that isn't my own two feet to not drop me.

"Afraid of heights?!" the blonde woman asks loudly over the rotating blades and wind, looking at me, her Australian accent thick and beautiful and totally making me jealous. I shake my head no.

"It's not the height I'm worried about so much as the drop!" I shout back into the microphone. "Why are you here?!"

"I… was recruited by the Pentagon to decipher a strange signal that tried to hack into their systems. Whoever was behind it tried it _again_, this time with Air Force One, and this time succeeded hacking into the Pentagon security system, downloaded a tone of information, and uploading a virus into the system _at the same time_,!" she says, emphasizing 'at the same time', which successfully dropped my jaw onto my lap, since I know a little about that, and even I can't hack into the Pentagon, let alone download data and upload a virus – that is too deadly – all at once. "And all that in under a minute. Once I realized there was a message encrypted in the signal, I copied it and took it to Glen to hack into it!" Australia says, nodding her head at her companion.

"No man, you didn't bring it ta me, you busted into my grand mama's house without a warning, tellin' me you needed help!" the man – Glen, I guess – complains loudly.

"Under a minute?!" I shout back in, speaking even louder – I have this thing where I feel like no one hears me if I don't hear myself, so I shout at everyone every time I'm speaking with music on.

"We had to shut down the entire system and reboot it before they stole everything and fried what was left of us!" I stare in awe, marveling over what they – I assume that would be either the Autobots or the Decepticons, since I doubt anyone on Earth is smart enough to get Air Force One to shut all their systems down; those guys can handle anything I ever tried to throw at them! – did, wishing it was me who did that. I would become absolutely the most famous anonymous hacker in history if I pulled that off! They got the Air Force One to shut down a defense network! I'd get so much recognition with my fellow cyber-criminals who no one is ever going to know about. If it were me – I now put it on my to-do list – I'd be the greatest hacker the world will never know about!

"The signal was evolving; it was learning. Anything we threw at it, it just adapted to, got smarter and stronger. It was unlike anything I've ever seen and- I'm sorry, I'm getting carried away."

I only laugh at that. "No, lady; it's cool!" I shout back. "Trust me, I was cracking signals when I was in grade five, so don't worry, you're making perfect sense! I just don't get how a signal could evolve like that! I was working on a- I mean I was _reading_ about a smart-virus-" lame name, I know, "-and even it had a year of works to go! It's a super virus, designed to rival a super computer level security system. It learns on its own, like an actual virus; evolving on its own, instead of with a hacker's assistance. But there is no way it could have hacked AFO in under a minute… That's just crazy!"

I have every camera – cell phones, computers, security camera – in any CIA building in two minutes, I can break down the Firewalls without being spotted in… ten minutes tops, I was reading the Whitehouse email from age ten – not that I understood anything – but I have yet to bust through the Pentagon.

"I took the signal to Glen, but the copy was spotted and the cops came after us." That's when Glen snaps at her to shut up.

"Ah told you naht to say anything ta anyone! This can cost me mah reputation!" he cries, his voice hitching on the last word of both sentences. Wait… why would she go to Glen with a signal that broke down the security system? Oh I get it! Hello fellow hacker!

"Hold up!" I say loudly, talking to Glen. "You hacked a signal that hacked AFO?!"

"Might have," Glen croaks.

"That's awesome! You gonna have to show me how you did that!"

He waves a dismissing hand at me. "Nah! I learned it from a guy on the net. Far as I heard, he's the best hacker in the United States! If you want to learn anything, you gonna have ta find someone who knows someone, who knows him. I was just lucky to know the right people! He goes by The Raven!" I clench my jaw to keep it from falling open. He learned how to hack a probably extraterrestrial signal from 'The Raven'?

I press my lips into a tight line, just barely keeping a smug smile off my face. Yeah, _real_ subtle in these things, aren't I? Ok, I might have a couple of educational sights for young hackers. I have a blog where people can post all sorts of requests, and every now and then, I do the job I signed up for by starting the blog and fulfill some of them. I get stuff like "please hack into my boyfriends accounts to tell me if he's cheating on me" or "please get a hold of all my husband's phone calls so I can prove that he's unfaithful", or "please send me a copy of my school division's final exam answer key", or "need info on my husband's finances!".

Little things like that, which I then use to find some interesting things. You have no idea what you can find out about a person just looking at their email. It's usually nothing much, but the kind of email they get, and from what people can really tell a great deal about who they are as a person. Mostly it isn't anything grand, but once I get my hands on a bank account, my week becomes that much better – depends on how much money they have to spare. It isn't like I'm hurting anyone; I'm only getting a few hundred at a time, not to draw attention. And while I'm at it, I check all the money transfers, when and where they were made, and sometimes, I come across a real expensive dinner at a very classy restaurant that the wife didn't know anything about.

It's what I do: get information. It's what I'm best at. I get things I shouldn't know, and I help people get those things on their own… if they're good enough to find 'The Raven'.

It's all encrypted in code and cipher, and only the only ones who can find me are those who already know who I am. Nobody knows about me. All they see is just a guy who gets a hold of their child's email, Facebook, etc. account to see who the kid is talking to, and reports back to them. The actual work I do no one knows about. All I do that people see is show people how to do it. 'The Raven' is a teacher and/or help line for newbie hackers.

The poor newbies get caught, though, because they always miss a step. I keep tabs on all cybercrime-related news casts and other information sources. Just two weeks ago a young teen hacker was caught. He was described as a high school trouble maker who did drugs and got suspended on a weekly basis. Actually, all reports were damn near identical to that. They were always some thug dude who liked getting into trouble.

Talk about cliché. This begs the question, though: is that how they see us? Is that how they see _me_?

What am I talking about? No one sees me _at all_. And that's just how I like it. No one can know about me. I'm not even one of the good guys; not in there, not on the cyber-world. Everyone has secrets… until I expose them.

It's in my blood, I suppose, to find out what people are hiding, and exploit it. I'm very good at getting information, and I'm even better at using it. I guess it's just my nature to tell things that people want to keep buried. I can't be entrusted with secrets because the temptation of giving them away is always too much for me. I don't keep anybody's secrets, except for Sam. And ever with him, not always. We have a lot of fights over this very matter. I taught Sam to never trust me with anything too important. The more interesting it is, the stronger the urge is to tell.

Moral of the story: don't trust me with so much as your locker combination, because I'll dig up some real nasty stuff about you.

"Hold on so… let me get this straight! _You_ stole a top secret file and took it to _him_; and _you_ hacked it; and _both_ of you were busted?!"

"Yeah! Pretty much! And you? What are you three here for?!"

Before I can open my mouth, Sam answers. "Uh… I bought a car! It turned out to actually be an alien robot!" Australia's face freezes in an expression of shock, while Hacker mouths the word "wow". I nod my head smugly. The big guys may have hacked the Pentagon and stole data, but we met them personally – both the good guys, _and_ the bad guys. "Who knew?"

"And I just happened to be in the right place in the right time," Mikaela says with a smirk. We keep making small talk to keep away from awkward silence until I turn to my right to look outside and see some sort of huge dam. I dig my nails into the seat as the helicopter bancs to the side, maneuvering for a land.

Once finally on the ground, we go through a very long and confusing process of getting out of the million buckles and straps, and finally, I'm free. I practically shove Sam forward climbing out after him and sighing in relief when my feet hit the ground. Sweet dear Earth, I have missed you! But before I can appreciate the ground beneath my feet fully, we are ushered into yet another black van, and driven off.

"I swear if I see another black van, I'll scream," I say with a huff. We don't drive for long, and once there, the van stops and we are let out. Outside, it's only about seven in the morning, the sun shining brightly, and I'm once again reminded how early I had to get up.

But the thought is quickly brushed aside when I see the view from all the way up here, at the very top of the dam. I follow Sam and Mikaela, wedging myself between the two and lean dangerously over the edge, instantly becoming dizzy. But the view was amazing! I could wee so far from so high, the river stretching and curving like a blue watery snake, glimmering in the rising sun.

I pull my phone out and take a snap shot of it, first vertically and then horizontally for laptop wallpaper use. Then I take a few steps back. "Hey guys, look here!" I call out to my two companions. They abide and, seeing the camera in front of my face, get into position, leaning back onto the cement 'railing'. I take a photo, than kneel on the ground, taking a picture from a lower angle, and then another one from the left, all three being in different poses from the two. "Lovely!" I chirp excitedly.

"Here, give me that," Sam says. We trade places, and I get up onto the wall, my legs on it in front of me, leaning back on my hands. A soft breeze blows past me, and I close my eyes, saying a little prayer about not falling because of the wind and Sam take a picture of me sitting on the dam. This is so going up on Facebook. Maybe I'm even submitting it to the yearbook comity. Yes, I'm _definitely_ doing that.

"Ooh! I have an idea!" Mikaela exclaims, clapping her hands like a child. "Sam, go over there and sit on the wall. Raven, get down and stand in front to form him." We do as she says, and I put on a winning smile as Sam wraps his arms around my tightly, protectively, lovingly. I take hold of one of his arms, leaning my head on it and Mikeala take a photo. "Wonderful! Ok, now Sam swing one leg over the edge, and Raven, sit tight next to him, and hug again!" I get up on the wall, going back into Sam's embrace, leaning into his chest, feeling his heart beat rapidly against me. After another two pictures, vertical and horizontal, we get off, and I take my phone, shoving Mikeala to the edge of the dam.

"Come on, it your turn to go solo." She crosses her legs over and leans back on their elbows, her hair over one shoulder, casting a nice shadow on her face. I gotta give it to her: the girl can look _really_ hot when she wants to, because right now, if I were a guy, I'd be getting… you know… yeah… "You look great! Ok for real, you're gonna have to teach me how you do that," I say.

"Do what?" the girl asks innocently, batting her eyelashes at me. Yeah, she's good.

"Look guys," I say, flipping through the photos we just took.

"Oh! I like that one!" Sam says, jabbing a finger at the screen – the photo where he's sitting one leg over the dam, with me cradled into his arms, and soft, joyous smile on his boyish face.

"Alright; that's enough bonding time, we aren't here on a tour," some soldier says, appearing out of nowhere so suddenly that I actually jump, my hand flying to my heart.

"Would ya make some noise?!" I snap, turning around to face whoever it is. We are ushered away from the edge of the dam as I put my phone back onto my pocket. Down the bridge which leads to the elevator – if I'm not mistaken – waits a guy in a bullet proof vest and a pair of black shades – a guy I recognize to be that creep who checked Mikaela; Simmons. I'd smack him if I wasn't a chicken and if I thought I could actually hurt him any. But sadly, I left my strength in my video games, and in real life, I can't even smack Sam and make it hurt.

We stop in front of him, and I glance at Sam to see his distasteful look, and then glance the other way to see Mikaela's hateful and disgusted look. I wouldn't put it past her to castrate him, given that deathly look in her eyes. She doesn't say or do anything; she just looks at him, which adds to the effect. The look alone sends a shiver up my arms.

Simmons starts babbling on and on about some crap no one cares about, putting a hand on Sam's shoulder. Sam gives that hand a look as if it's infected with some incurable virus, and then cuts him off impatiently. "Where is my car?" A half-bald guy appears next to Simmons, as the said man glares at my best friend.

"Son," he says, "listen to me very carefully; people can die here. We need to know everything you know, and we need to know it now." Sam presses his lips into a tight line, not wanting any of the bullshit. I see it in an instant, and thank dear god above for giving Sam such a movie loving friend that Miles is. Sam has something they want, so he is in the position to demand and negotiate.

"Ok…" Sam says through his teeth, trying to control himself. "But first I'll take my car, my parents… you might want to write that down. I want you to ensure Raven's future will be a financially healthy one, and she will get into a good college regardless of her educational achievements because _for your information_," Sam hisses, leaning in and getting all up in Simmons' face, "she got a silver in the computer programming Olympics _of the country_. Oh and one more thing: Mikaela's juvenile record… it's gotta be gone… for good."

I gasp a little at his conditions – particularly the ones about me. I purse my lips in anger and jab him in the ribs with my elbow, hissing "I didn't ask for your help," bitterly. But it breaks my heart when he looks down at me for a fraction of a second. The look in his eyes is… confusing; a mix between hurt and pity and sadness, He was really trying to help me and I snapped at him. But I _didn't ask him_ to help me or speak as if he knows anything.

Mikaela silently thanks him as we are lead away, and I glare at her, drilling holes in the back of her neck. That little… perfect girl. Look at her, all smiley and giggly and blushy, with sad eyes and perfect curves; all grateful about Sam sticking up for her. And me… I didn't ask to be protected, and suddenly I'm the bad guy here, being made feel guilty as I should be. I fight a short battle between my pride and the fact that Sam was trying to help me out, make my life better. He had the power to negotiate my position and any further possible positions anywhere outside of KFC, and I snapped at him and hurt him.

Yeah ok, my ego was a total bitch just then.

I lean closer to him, pulling down at his shoulder to get his ear to my level, say softly. "I'm being rude again, aren't I?" He looks down at me, and it breaks my heart to see what his eyes – those truthful, honest, caring green eyes – hold. He has already forgiven me. "I don't know why you put up with me."

"You're just really stuck up and annoying and can be a real pain in the behind sometimes. But you're only like that sometimes. All the other times… they outweigh your snapping out. You stick with me, and I stick with you; that was the promise. Just try to say it nicely next time. I don't particularly enjoy getting bruised ribs because I'm trying to look after you – because frankly, you aren't mature enough to look after yourself. And I'm gonna be here all the time, ready to kick some sense into you."

And even when I don't get the shivers, I don't believe he's really over what I said. Great going, dumbass; now you hurt him by opening that big mouth of yours. I'm so proud of you, Raven. I want to slap myself for what I said to Sam just a few minutes ago. How disgusting was that? But then again, he _did_ jump in where he wasn't needed, sticking his nose in my business. _Again_.

"Alright here's the situation," Simmons announces as we get out of the elevator, walking towards the entrance of the dam. "We have all had direct contact with the NBE's," he says, his voice all high and mighty. NBE… that came up on my search for Sector Seven last night. But what _was_ it?

"What are NBE's?" a black soldier walking on the other side of Simmons – we've been joined with a handful of solders, who, apparently, met these 'NBE's as well as we did (again, apparently) – asks the question on everyone's minds.

"Non-Biological Extraterrestrials, try to keep up with the acronyms," Simmons explains conceitedly, like it's the most obvious thing in the world, and everyone should know about it, even if it's from some top secret organization.

Non-Biological-… Oh I get it! He's talking about… But why not just call them GRTs or Giant Robot Things? The original title is too long and hard to remember. I like the name much better and it was much easier to remember than 'Non-Biological Extraterrestrials.

We enter the dam and to through at least five minutes of security, the soldiers there are doing eye-scans, and fingerprint scans, and tons of other scans on anyone who is an S-7 staff member, before letting us in. We walk through a maze of corridors, doctors and solders walking about their way.

"What you are about to see is totally classified," the half bald guy announces as we walk through a little tunnel and into a giant room or hangar

But once inside, I freeze, my gaze trailing upward in complete and utter shock at the figure in front of me. I find, and grab a tight hold of Sam's hand, and cower behind him, hoping the fact that he's taller than me will help conceal me from any possible view. Looming like a ghost, completely frozen in ice, was the one I recognized from a holographic projection Optimus showed us in the alley: Megatron.

_Oh. Shit__._

**AN: so what do you think? Did you like it? Again, please leave at least for reviews per chapter, telling me something - anything - you thouhgt about the chapter, and I will reply to any review over a hundred and fifty characters.  
**

**Also, I feel like Raven is becoming too much of a Mary-Sue, or not making sense to people. This opinion may vary from person to person, but this is _VARY IMPORTANT:_**

**Please PM me, and list all the things you notice about her that do not make her a Mary-Sue. The realistic human traits and flaws that make Raven a believable character. Anything and Everything you notice about her as a person, that make her not a Mary-Sue, so that I know how you as readers see her. The last thing I want is to make a perfect character, because those are just annoying. I NEED TO KNOW HOW YOU SEE HER.**

**Have an absolutely wonderful day or night, and I will see you all next time.**


	11. Chapter 11

**AN: ok guys, this chapter is so long! I wanted to make it up to you for making you wait so long for the previous chapter, and also because I sat down and couldn't stop typing.**

**Also, this is a much-awaited chapter for me, so if you can all be lovely and give me all your support in the reviews, I would love you all forever, and give you all cookies! Pretty, pretty please, just tell me that you love it, and why you love it! I really want to smile at all your reviews when I read them!**

**Also, if you have any questions about the story, plot, chapter, or even author herself, ASK AWAY! I will gladly answer them.**

**P.S.: I'm only responding to reviews of over a hundred characters. Anyway; I'm so excited that I won't keep you waiting. Please read and love and tell me that you do!**

The world around me stood completely still as I gazed up at the frozen robot – who is easily as tall as Optimus – towering menacingly over the vast room. It frightened the living day light out of me but I managed to control myself from turning around and running the hell away, instead, clinging to Sam tighter, looking for some form of protection and shelter from the thing's possible sight. I stared at the robot in a mixture of shock at how he was here, terror of that he was here, and confusion of why he was here as the world around me started to slowly come back into focus, blended noises separating into sentences and words.

"– shipped him here to this facility in 1934," the half-bald guy – 'Guy' with a capital from now on – announced.

"We call him NBE-One," Simmons called out loud and clear, making sure everyone heard. I looked at him and rolled my eyes at the given name. I know about the Autobots for less than twelve hours, and I already know more than they do – or at least I think I do; how knows, maybe they discovered some real interesting stuff about how the Cybertronians work down here. Point is: I know their names, and the very basic over-view of history of their planet, and these guys call the Warlord "NBE-One".

I nudged Sam as we come up closer to the platform the giant is standing on, shooting a glance to Megatron, then to Simmons, and then back to Sam. But he was faster than me, because that moment I looked at him fully, I saw that he was already going to tell Simmons. Sam cleared his throat, drawing all attention to the two of us.

"Sir, I don't mean to correct you on everything you think you know, but… that's Megatron," he said, pointing up at the giant. Simmons scrawled upon this new information, and I gave him a smug look, as if to say "ha! We know this and you don't! In your face!"

Clearly, Simmons caught that very well, and didn't like it, or what Sam said one bit. "He's the leader of the Decepticons," Sam explained. "You got the leader of the most hostile aliens out there in your backyard. He's like… Darth Vader meets the overgrown Terminator." I was sure that Simmons had to have at least considered this. Sure I disliked him a fair bit, but he wasn't working for Sector-7 for nothing. He was smart, he had to be; he would not be working in a top secret government agency otherwise.

"He's been in cryostasis since 1935. Your great-great-grandfather made one of the greatest discoveries in the history of mankind," the half-bald guy told Sam. I made a silent "wow" of amazement. That is _so_ cool. Now I wished _my_ ancestor was crazy like Sam's – turns out the crazy old man discovered an alien race!

"Fact is you're looking at the source of the modern age." Simmons announced, pacing slowly between us and the concrete/metal pedestal that held Megatron. "All microchip, lasers, spaceflight, cars; all reverse-engineered by studying him," he shouted, jabbing a finger towards the warlord. "_NBE-One_; that's what we call it," he snapped, taking a step closer to Sam, looking intimidating. Naturally, I felt very uncomfortable under his gaze – the gaze which is followed by the watchful eyes of the rest of the tour group.

But Sam apparently asked the Wonderful Wizard of Oz for some more of those guts he had in the confrontation at the lake when all he did was snort. "'It'? Oh you guys are in _so_ much trouble. You are keeping an alien who started a war that wiped out an entire planet inside of Hoover Dam like it's some sort of monument of exhibit at a museum. And the moment the Decepticons find out, they will come, and they will take him back. And believe me; they won't be nice about it. If they come, and they _will_ come, you will have hell to pay for this."

My mouth dropped open at that, and Simmons' face reddened. When did Sam get so ballsy? He just tolled of a member of a secret government agency! I could understand how he would do that when talking to Trent and his dogs, but this is a whole new level of _guts_ we've reached here.

"And you didn't think that the United States military might need to know that you're keeping a hostile alien frozen in the basement?" a man I didn't recognize and didn't even know was here till now, due to his silence, asked, sounding very official. The Guy turned to face him as he explained this.

"Until recent developments, we had no evidence of threat to national security." At this point, I had built up enough nerve to speak.

"I'm… I'm sorry… but we are not talking national security anymore, Sir; we're speaking on a global scale. You kept the leader of the Decepticon imprisoned here since the thirties. When he wakes, he won't be pleased, and from what I heard about him-" which really wasn't that much, but also perfectly enough "-the entire planet will be paying the price."

The un-named man gave me a nod, and then turned back to Guy. "You got one now," he said, motioning to me.

"So why Earth?" a solder – a particularly _hot_ solder, with tanned skin, dark hair, and chestnut colored eyes – asked. I took a step back, leaning backwards towards Mikeala, and whispered ever so quietly in her ear, "I'd tap that." She gave me a look that tells me that she's fantasizing about him as well, a dreamy look in her eyes.

"It's the Allspark," Sam explained, sounding a little unnerved about something. "They came here looking for this cube thing. It's got some sort of power in it or something – I'm not really sure, but it's really important to them. Anyway, mister NBE-One here, aka _Megatron_," he said, exaggerating "Megatron" as he leaned a little closer to Simmons, making eye-contact and raised his eyebrows at the older men. "That what _they_ call him; he wants to use the cube to transform human technology to a bunch of robotic warriors, and kill off all the Autobots and take over. That's the over-view; you're gonna have to talk to him about the details.

"You're _sure_ about that?" Simmons asked him, sounding a bit worried. Sam gave him a small nod, before his eyes widened a little, in realization.

"You know where it is, don't you." Simmons tensed, staring at Sam for a long moment, before finally gesturing for us to come with him.

"Follow me." We abide, the entire group trailing after him, farther and farther away from Megatron. The farther we got away, the better I felt. As we walked, I left Sam's side, joining Mikeala a little way back, and the two of us slow down, letting the group pass us before we allowed ourselves to whisper between ourselves.

"Oh my God, did you see him? He was _so_ hot!" Mikeala silently squealed, jumping up and down as she walked, hands balled up at her chest.

"I know, right? I so hope he isn't like… twice my age or something, 'cause I'd totally go out with a such a treat. How's your 'tight abs and big muscles' weakness there, eh?" I teased the dark-haired girl. She shoved my shoulder, her mouth dropping open. But then she laughed.

"I swear, when I saw him I thought I'd faint!" she whisper-squealed in giddy, her voice concealed with the surrounding noise. We walked down a hallway, away from the vast room – or is it more of a hangar – which served as a prison to Megatron for over half a century.

"You're about to see our crown jewel," Simmons announced as we entered a room, which shrunk as the near dozen of us tried to all cram into it. One wall was almost all glass, providing a really nice view of… The Allspark. And if I thought Optimus was gigantic, then I didn't even know the name for this. For the sake of comparison, Optimus to the cube was like me to Optimus – and I'm saying Optimus because he's the biggest of the Autobots.

The cube was absolutely huge! But what caught my attention was not its sheer size, but the simple fact that it was _here_; a mere walking distance away from Megatron.

"Carbon dating puts the cube here at around 10,000 B.C. The first Seven didn't find it until 1913," Guy said just I glanced behind me, peeking between everyone to the wall across from the window, a circle of seven pictures hanging on it. "They knew it was alien because of the matching hieroglyphics on the cube, as well as NBE-One. President Hoover had the damn built around it. Four football fields thick of concrete to block the cubes energy from being detected by anyone or… any alien species on the outside."

His words sunk in and I felt a shiver run down my spine. Megatron was looking for the Allspark, His search lead him to Earth, where Sam's great-granddad found him. And they brought him exactly to where he wanted to be; right there, an arm's length away from the object he was looking for all this time. If he gets free… dear God.

"Wait, you said the dam hides the cube's energy, what kind of energy exactly?" Blondie asked curiously from beside the official-looking guy. This seemed to have been the right question, because Guy spoke up, immediately answering the question… more or less.

"Good question," he commended, and motioned for us to follow him. After several turns through several uniform corridors, we found ourselves in a room made entirely of metal and it gave off a "torture room" vibe. Probably because the walls were covered in claw marks of various animals – well… more like supper animals, if they managed to shred a metal wall. In the middle of the now-small room stood a glass box, with wiring attached to it from all sides, running to and from the room, monitors and machinery lining the walls. "Everyone step inside. They have to lock us in," Guy instructs.

We all followed orders and I felt very nervous when I heard the door hiss a little. They locked us in a room that was shredded to bits by someone. The effects of all the horror movies I've ever watched kicked in and I had to wonder for one second, how many people may have been in this room when it happened.

The dark skinned solder from earlier mumbled something about Freddie Cruger being imprisoned in here, but the Computer Geek corrected him enthusiastically, telling him that Freddie – I shuttered at the memory of the movie – had four blades, but the claw mark are of three, so it's more likely that I that it was Wolverine. The solder turner to give Computer Geek an annoyed look, and my hands shot to my mouth as I saw two fresh gash scars on his neck. They looked a couple of days old at the most.

"Does anyone have a mechanical device? Blackberry, key alarm, cell phone?" Simmons asked everyone, and everyone stuck their hands in their pockets. I pulled out my cell from my bag, tossing it to him before I could stop myself.

"You break it, you buy me the latest model; got it?" I told him.

"Young lady, you are in no position to make requests," he snapped at me, catching my phone with both hands. I glared at him for that, but let it go. If he's gonna show us what energy they were talking about, I figured it might as well be worth it. Or he's just going to break it and I'm going to be left without a phone.

Black goggles were passed around and I put my pair over my head as Simmons put my cell inside the box. I leaned in for a better look, noticing small claw marks on the inside of the metal caging. I gulped uneasily as the box was slammed shut. In the middle of the box was an air-spray gun-looking thing, aimed downward. My interest was piqued now, my curiosity at what will happen next eating away at me.

Simmons then gets to answering Blondie's question from before. "We're able to take the cube radiation… and funnel it into this box," he said as he flipped down several switches and leavers. I watched power rush through the gun and flash into the cell phone, the whole room filling up with blinding light. I saw then, why we were given these goggles: the light would have easily temporarily blinded me.

My phone absorbed the energy, which apparently came from the Allspark. I heard a soft hissing noise before it began to rattle, before exploding into… some sort of insect; one I can only describe as an ant. With two round, drop-like halves of its shiny, silver body, six thin legs, one eye, and the claw things on an actual ant's face. It was about the size of the palm of my hand, and it freaked the hell out of me. I was never a fan of bugs, and screamed like five year old every time a spider got too close. Ants were a particular not-favorite of mine, and this one was huge!

It looked around in confusion for a little, before charging at the glass casing, only to bounce backwards when it doesn't give.

"What _is_ that thing?!" Blondie cried in shock, taking her goggles off. I did that same, taking a better look at the overgrown ant.

"Mean little sucker, eh?" Simmons said smugly, apparently happy at the ant's struggle and confusion. It charged at the glass again, this time faster, and the glass broke into a spider web of cracks. The ant fell back upside-down, its legs flailing rapidly as it tried to flip itself over.

"It's _freaky_!" Australia exclaimed. My phone… is a metal insect? Oh my God! Simmons just turned my cell into a metallic ant! That is just… Argh! How the hell am I going to use it now?! I can't use that thing; I don't want it _anywhere_ near my face! But the phone cost me money! A lot of money, and I can't just throw all the money away. And what happens if someone called me, huh?

"Kind of like an itty bitty energizer bunny from hell," Simmons said, still smiling in disgust at the ant. I actually had to sympathize with the ant a little. I think I felt just as he did now when I first met the Autobots. I mean, these five giants just went from cars to aliens. They were totally creepy, and huge, and dangerous. I was really freaked out then – especially after the three of us were attacked by one of their kind. We must look just as freak to it as we do to him.

But I had bigger problems. "Simmons," I spoke slowly, trying to control my anger, "when I told you not to break my phone, did I need to spell it out that turning it into a giant ant robot was not an option? You could have warned me!"

"And what? Spoil the surprise?"

"This isn't a surprise, Mr. Simmons; this is taking a cell that cost me three hundred dollars, and turning it into a metal insect! I _cannot_ afford to have to get me a new phone! And what if someone calls me? Then the ant will pick up… wait… that doesn't make any sense. Well you get it! That's my phone; I can't use it now!" I shouted, freaking out. That phone was expansive as it was. I can't get myself a new one, and I _need_ my phone. I've got stuff on it, like pictures. That phone has the pictures of an alien species! There is now way in hell I'm parting with those. I write fanfiction chapter on it while in class, and then email them to myself to put them on my phone, but I have an entire chapter on there; I can't part with that either!

Suddenly a gun appeared out of nowhere, strapped onto its… back side, I suppose, and it started shooting away at the glass in every direction, running around trying to get out. When the gun didn't make any difference, the ant put it away. Instead, he aimed the antennas coming out of its head at the glass. What I can only describe as a blue laser beam shot out of them, directly at the glass, and everyone moved away with a sharp cry of both surprise and fear as it cut a perfect circle in the glass. I stared with my mouth hanging open.

Ok… freaky or not, that was the most awesome thing I'd seen in a long time.

"It's breaking the glass!" Mikeala exclaimed, frantically pointing at the ant with one hand, while covering her mouth with the other.

"Yo man… that is like some Sci-Fi shit there…" Computer geek mumbled. "That was the coolest thing ever!" My thoughts exactly, my friend… my thoughts exactly. So what now? Will it charge at the glass again, jump out, and claw someone's eyes out? Or will it just run away and hid because it's scared? And will I let them step on my phone to break it, losing my cell forever, or will I try to not let them do that? No, that's just crazy, Yeah, I need a phone, but I'm not _that_ desperate as to use a mechanical bug as one. It's a bug; bugs are pests, vermin. They are useless and should be stepped on every time one is spotted.

But again, that bug cost me a by-weekly paycheck. If it's a mechanical bug, it better as hell make up for it by being one hell of a good phone. Hold up… am I seriously considering keeping this bug-phone thing? Besides, they'll kill it anyway. But then look at it: it's probably just really scared. It woke up to see a bunch of huge, pinkish-yellowish creatures with creepy, black bug-eyes staring at it. That was the first thing it ever saw in all its half-a-minute-long life.

It's my phone. It's a bug. It's my phone. It's a _bug_.

No, it's my cell phone, and I need my cell phone and everything that is on it. I have hundreds of pictures, and songs and videos and photos I will never be able to take again.

This phone has so many pictures of Sam and me – the recent ones being my current favorite. I will never be able to take another picture like that. The sun will be in the wrong place, and the wind will be blowing the wrong way, and the scene will just not be the same. Those pictures we took less than a half hour ago will never be taken again. They are unique, precious moments that I chose to capture in a still photo, and keep forever. Those are irreplaceable. I might be able to get myself a new phone, but the things on this one will never be again.

"Can I have my phone back now?" I asked.

"I'm sorry, come again?"

"I said: can I have my phone back now? You've shown off what you learned the cube can do; good job to you for figuring that out. Now can you please give me back my cell phone? It cost me three hundred dollars, and I have tones of stuff on there that I wouldn't give up to some government organization for a million dollars. Can I please get my phone back?" I repeated.

"Sorry kid, not an option. That thing is not the first, and trust me on this: you don't want it to get out," Simmons told me strictly, but also with the slightest bit of something I can _almost_ call concern.

"Raven, I thought you were scared of ants," Sam sinkers behind me. I elbow him in the ribs.

"Oh shut up, you; yeah, I hate ants and spiders and bugs in general, but like I said, this bug was one expensive sucker," I explained. "Besides… it's kind of alive now. What are you gonna do to it? Take it away and conduct experiments? Kill it? Is that what you are going to do to Bumblebee? They're living beings; all of them. I'm pretty sure that killing them wouldn't be as simple as stepping on an insect; it would be murder."

"Who's 'Bumblebee'?" Simmons asked, sounding not in the least interested. I knew it wasn't a question I was supposed to answer, but I did open my mouth to do so, only to have my attention drawn to the ant in the cage. He trailed back to the far end of the cage, and charged – at a ridiculous speed for something his small size, if I may add – at the circle in the glass wall. Only then did I realize I was standing right in front of him. I didn't even notice I moved while I was talking, and the next moment, I was holding the plate of glass in place with both hands to keep the ant inside the glass box.

I was about to say something, but I was cut off by a faint, barely audible, but definite explosion somewhere far away, and then the lights flickered on and off. Everyone froze in place, not even so much as breathing. There was a very brief moment of utter silence, before the official-looking guy spoke up. "Gentlemen… they know the cube is here."

Guy was at the intercom in seconds, demanding to know what was going on.

"The NBE-One hanger has lost power, and the backup generator is not going to cut it!" came the reply. Megatron's hanger? You have _got_ to be _kidding_ me! Of all the places to lose power. Talk about bad freaking luck! The last thing we needed right now was a very pissed off Megatron going on a killing spree.

"Do you have an arms room?" Mister Hotty – *faint in a very dramatic, girly way* – asked, walking up to Guy. He nodded rapidly and motioned for us to follow him. The door was unlocked and everyone rushed out… forgetting me in the room.

"Wait guy!" I shouted, waving one hand over my head, and holding the plate of glass in place with the other as the ant tried ramming its head into it again, but to no avail. I had to admit though, that the ant was pretty darn strong. "You forgot me!" I cried. I looked desperately between the hallway where Sam heard me and pulled to a stop, turning around and motioning me to come impatiently, and then at the ant in the box. It was my expensive phone, with irreplaceable things occupying its memory space. I have to at least transfer everything onto my laptop before handing the ant over to Sector Seven – who apparently forgot about it altogether when the main power supply went out. I let out a loud groan of frustration.

I'm going to regret every moment of this. I let go of the glass, and pushed it in, letting it fall inside the box. Gulping in disgust that the thought that I'm about to have a bug touch my skin, but reached my hand slowly into the box, palm up, putting on the friendliest face I can manage. I had no idea how much the ant understood at this point, buy I really hoped it knew at least basic body language.

"Well? Are you coming or are you staying?" Reluctantly, it moved forward towards my hand, looking over it like it might turn into a gun and shoot him. I started to move my hand away, looking dead serious. The ant hurried to climb onto my hand and I shivered. "Ehhh! I have an insect on my hand!" I complained loudly, taking my hand out of the box. I grabbed the ant with my other hand, holding it tightly, and ran out of the room, to Sam, where I had to explain why I had the ant squirming in my hand. We argued back and forth over the wisdom of the idea of just grabbing the ant like it was no big deal since it _did_ try shooting at us – or the glass… or at us, but the glass was in the way, but that was the first option anyway.

I dismissed it, explaining why I couldn't leave my phone behind, but there were no words to really explain how precious everything on that phone was. It held every major memory of the last three years in it. The trip to the zoo, that concert, the spring dance we went to together, the first 'A' Sam got after he made his deal for three 'A's and two grand in exchange for a car, the Halloween costumes we wore last year, decorating Sam's house for Christmas, and much, _much_ more precious, irreplaceable moments and all the things it would be a crime to forget: me getting bit by Mojo, a yellow school bus, the driver shouting at us to get out of the doorway in the background, baking cookies for the fund-raiser… everything is on this phone. I couldn't care less what it turns into. It can become a centipede for all I care; there is no way I'm losing all of that.

Just thinking about it made me realize how amazingly, incredibly, dysfunctionally perfect my life is – how complete it is. I have absolutely everything even when I have little. I have the best of memories, and they all outweigh the troubles and hardships I've faced. I have the one person who gives me hope in the word right next to me, holding my hand and supporting me in everything. He kicks my ass when I deserve it, and laughs when I fall, filming it and posting it online before helping me up.

We faced the monsters under the bed together, and stayed in the closet all night just to prove that there was no boogeyman in it. We hid in the bathroom in the museum, and stayed after closing hours to see if the exhibits come to life. We had a phobia of museums ever since then – also together.

_When you fall, I can't promise I'll pick you up. But I _do_ promise that I'll lie down beside you_. It was an oath – an everlasting promise that played through my head every time I was unsure of myself. It was a promise of that I'll never have to face something alone. It was a promise that we will always pull through anything and everything the world will throw at us. We will make it over our disagreements and secrets and distrust; we will hide things from each other, and lie, and we will stick together through it all.

Because people say that in true friendship, there are no secrets, but it's not true. There are always secrets. True friendship accepts that there _are_ secrets and there _are_ lies; it accepts them all, and it gives time to open up. That's friendship; _that's_ closeness: the understanding that there are things you can't trust people with, and you give your loved ones time, you help them, and then you wait for them to trust you a little more.

I know that if our rolls were switched and it was Sam who was keeping major things from me, I'd wait for him for a hundred years… and then I'd wait a hundred more.

We hurried after Guy into the arms room. I really shouldn't have been surprised when I saw all the weapons, since it was an arms room, but it was still weird to see all the different guns in there, placed so plainly around like there was absolutely nothing wrong. I always hated guns, and the fact that it was legal to carry a gun around only made it worse; it just gave people an excuse to shoot someone. Even in my neighborhood, with my neighbors, I didn't have a gun. Even where I lived, never had I been a victim to burglary or kidnapping. So all those who were afraid someone will break into their home… relax, will you? What are the odds of someone walking up to your house in the middle of the day and saying "I'm gonna rob this house"?

Every man in the room was grabbing any and every weapon they laid their eyes on, loading them with rounds. Mikeala – who was just as shocked as Sam to see the little ant in my hand (oh my God; I am holding an insect! Ewe!) – Sam and I chose to stay well out of the way. I take this time to look over my used-to-be phone, hoping that it can still become a phone. The ant protested against my hold on it, and, realizing this, I let it go, allowing it to rest on my wide-open palms. It made a lot of noises of protest, and I tried my best to sooth it, hoping it wouldn't go killer robot and shoot us all. I – and the "how" was beyond me here – managed to get it to relax and stop shouting and calm down.

Once it was calm, Mikaela for some reason proceeded to comparing the thing to a hamster – which in turn lead _me_ to suggesting she saw a doctor. Blondie and Computer Geek also joined the conversation, noting at how it looked almost cute when it wasn't trying to shoot anyone.

Simmons caught up on the situation and I got a scolding from him and an attempt at taking the ant away. I replied to that with the fact that it was my phone, and he didn't have a warrant of confiscation, therefore it would be stealing. I knew exactly how stupid it sounded, but it was a last-ditch effort at keeping the ant/phone and everything on it. I couldn't expect him to understand how much value the phone held, and how important it was. I'd be devastated if I lost so much as one of those pictures. I wasn't an artist, but if I were, I'd draw every one of the photos I took. They were not something you can trust to memory, and those are things that would be punishable to forget.

But our argument was cut short when someone called Simmons, saving me any further convincing – since I had no excuses left in my arsenal.

Simmons wasn't away for a minute before we heard a crash, the lights flickering again. Everyone froze. A round was dropped into a magazine – I believe that's what it's called. I exchange a nervous look with Mikaela as Sam marches up to Simmons, talking fast and urgently.

"You have to take us to my car," Sam demands, getting right to the point. Simmons ignores him. "You have to take me to my car _right now_. He'll know what to do with the cube."

"Your car? It's confiscated," is all the agent says.

"Then _un_confiscate it," Sam tells him impatiently.

"We do not know what will happen if we let it near that thing," Simmons replies, loading his own gun, his voice rising. I really want to give him a piece of my mind right now, but I think I've been the center of attention enough for today… and the rest of the year, for that matter. I made enough of a scene back there, with asking to have my phone back. With everyone watching me, I felt like I was going to throw up right then and there!

I give Mikaela a pleading look which she immediately interprets, and speaks up. "Maybe you don't, but we do: he's gonna get it to safely, to his boss, and the planet won't be destroyed by Doctor Doom back there. And whose brilliant idea, by the way, was putting Megatron within walking distance of the Allspark, huh?" she questions, like she owns the place. I mentally applaud her for holding her ground like that. That girl is the bravest girl I think I've ever met. First she can fix cars, then she hacks up a little terror robot to bits with a power saw, next she finds a giant mechanical ant cute, and now she's subtly telling someone from a top secret government agency that they are an idiot. Is she related to Chuck Norris or something?

"I have people's _lives_ at stake here!" Simmons shouts fumingly. In that moment, Hotty grabbed Simmons by the arm and swung him around, slamming him into the parked Humvee. This triggered a chain reaction.

Clicks sound all over the room, the first being to the right of Hotty, and behind Sam, Mikaela and I, a Sector Seven man aiming his SIG SG-552. And all Hotty did was grab his own M1911A1 pistol and point it back at the man. "Drop it."

Another one of Simmons' men aimed his Heckler & Koch G36C at Hotty, just as another guy on his squad slammed his Heckler & Koch G36C into the man, and the one standing next to him. Another man on his team slammed the butt of his MP5A3 with an M68 Aimpoint scope – I've watched my share of movies – into an S-7 solder's face. Grunts and the clicking of guns sounded a few seconds longer and buy then, literally everyone was at gunpoint; even the five of us – Sam, Mikeala, and me, plus Blondie and Computer Geek.

Complete and utter silence.

"Drop your weapon, solder," Simmons commanded. No reaction. "There's an alien war going on out there and you're going to point your guns at me?"

"We didn't ask to be here," Hotty says breathlessly through his teeth.

"I'm ordering you under S-Seven executive jurisdiction-"

"-S-7 don' exist," the dark-skinned man states. I chuckle a little under my breath.

"That's right; and we don't take orders from people who don't exist," Hotty says. I think I just found my new favorite super heroes to be jealous of.

"I'm gonna count to five," Simmons threatens, but the solder doesn't take it. "And I'm gonna count to three," he retorts, shoving his M1911A1 into Simmons's chest. Yup… definitely my new heroes. These guys are not only totally, downright hot, but they are also kickass awesome!

The official-looking guy tells Simmons to obey, and, reluctantly, he does. Hotty lets him go, and he leads us away from the arms room, down a maze of corridors. Half way down one of the hallways, I hear an agonized, mechanical cry, and recognize it from the night before as a pained plea of the mute Autobot. Realization sinks in and I feel my heart tear at itself: they took him away, and hurt him, and I was focused on myself and my problems. I was selfish and inconsiderate, after Bumblebee saved our lives twice in one night. And all I did was blame him and his comrades. I instantly feel guilty, as I should.

Upon hearing the noises coming from inside a room behind the double doors at the end of the corridor, Sam speeds up to a run, slamming into the doors, and forcing them open with great effort. Mikeala and I, follow, along with everyone else. Sam is crying for everyone to stop, supported by the two of us, Guy, and the important dude – I wish I knew his name, so I don't have to call him that all the time.

Bumblebee's whines are louder here, echoing off the metal walls, making the sound unbearable. I run to his side, pushing past anyone in the way. Mikeala and make a round, violently shoving away anyone standing within seven feet of the block of metal and concrete they strapped Bumblebee to.

"Stop! Stop it!" Sam was yelling at the men angrily, Guy – there was no mistaking he was the one in charge here – backing up Sam's order with his own. I was too upset and angry myself, to care if I drew attention, calling out my own cries and orders.

"Stop hurting him!" Sam joined Mikaela and me, closer to where Bumblebee was, barking out an order for someone to release him. The shackles restraining Sam's guardian to the table hissed, and then opened, letting the Autobot go.

"How much did they hurt you?" Sam asks softly of his newfound friend and protector – the one who laid down his life for the green-eyed boy. All he got in response was a weak whirl; Bumblebee could barely make a single move. My heart tore at itself to see him like that; lying on a table, motionless, and for a moment I'm afraid of the worst.

But thankfully, he was alive, and recovering – hopefully. He turned around on that platform they held him on, looking around the room until his eyes centered on the three of us. I easily expected him to be furious and hate us after what humans did to him; a single look at Sam told me he felt the same. But there was a level of concern in Bumblebee's eyes when he looked at Sam, and I knew that he – somehow – still cared enough about him.

"Don't worry…" Sam says gently, trying to calm his guardian. "They won't hurt you again, I promise. I won't let them hurt you again. It's over," he assures Bumblebee. But the Autobot doesn't seem convinced in the least, because a mask slides over his face angrily, and he tries to push himself up, looking around himself cautiously.

His hand transforms into a canon, which he waves from one part of the room to another threateningly. Is buzzes loudly in the deathly silence, and I gulp thickly, waiting for something to happen.

"Listen to me…" Sam says carefully, "the Allspark is here… so is Megatron-" I see Bumblebee flinch slightly, "- and the Decepticons are coming. You gotta come with us. Come on… I'll take you to the cube. Don't worry about them; they won't hurt you anymore… I won't let them. Just come with us, ok? _Trust_ me," Sam pleads.

Slowly, Bumblebee puts the cannon away, his mask slicing up to reveal his sky-blue eyes.

.oOo.

By the time we made it back to the Allspark, the seemingly endless day was wearing on me. It was barely two hours since I had awoke, but I was already exhausted. I could just close my eyes and curl up on the floor, and go to sleep. But if I did, I'd miss the sight of a lifetime. It is then that I wish I hadn't given Simmons my phone to turn into an ant, because I'd lay down my life for a photo of what was happening.

We all watch in utter awe as electricity shoots through the humungous cube upon Bumblebee's touch. Before our eyes, the Allspark defies ass laws of physics, and _shrinks in_ on itself. It divided into a million small cubes, which fold into each other, down, down, down, until Bumblebee ends up holding it in his hands. I mimic Mikaela in placing my hands over my mouth in absolute amazement at how he did that. What only moments ago was a least ten times Optimus' size, was now a foot-by-foot box, identical to the Allspark, only shrunk a thousand times. That's an alien race for you. They will never seize to amaze.

Once the cube is in a condition to be moved, Bumblebee selects a satellite transmission – a clip from Star Trek, if I'm not mistaken – to let us know we need to get moving. Handing the Allspark over to Sam, he crouches down, parts shifting into place, giving him the form of a classy sports car that belongs only on a racing track.

Yup… it will never be anything but amazing.

"He's right: we're screwed with Megatron in the other hanger. Mission city is 22 miles away. I say we sneak that cube out of here and hide it somewhere in the city," Hotty suggested taking charge of the situation. I had a thought I was going to voice about how that may not be the best idea seeing as it was a _populated city_. But he was a solder; he knew best, I was sure of it.

"Good, right!" Official exclaims. However, the solder cuts him off with further instructions. "But we _cannot_ make a stand without the air force," he tells us all.

"This place must have some sort of radio link! Short wave! CB!" Official listed, Simmons nodding and getting in a few yeses of support.

"Sir, you gotta figure out a way to get word out to them! Everyone else let's move!" Hotty orders loudly. "Kids, get in the car," he tells us.

But that plan is not smiling at me at all. "I'll stay here," I say, and then go to cover the fear with, "help try to get communications up."

"You sure you can handle it?" Simmons challenges. All I give him is an "oh please" look. I have so many remarks I cannot voice on that. Like how I was intercepting military transmissions since I was twelve. Of course, any remark like that would either earn me a good laugh, and I'll be stuffed in that car, or I'd win a free trip to jail for the rest of my life.

So instead, I start the conversation by questioning where their main communication unit was. "This place is four football fields of rock. You need to have some form of outside communication link that can get through in case of emergency."

"We have an army radio console in the alien archives. We might be able to get it to work."

"Are you sure?" I question hopefully. "Because Megatron is right near the exit, so we won't be able to get on higher ground."

"I don't know; did you see…?" Simmons asked, me, pointing back at where the Allspark was, and then making a shirking motion with his hands. "_Anything_ is possible."

"Alright, lead the way; anyone who knows something about computers with us!" I shout. Then I freeze.

I turn around, seeing Sam rushing to Bumblebee in his car form, and my world seems to slow down. He was going to Mission City. Decepticons will follow. It will be very, _very_ dangerous. Suddenly I don't see the awkward boy who always talked a lot when he was nervous, or the boy who was frightened to easily, or the boy who screamed like a girl.

I see someone completely different. I see the boy who gave every last, desperate attempt to help when those he cared about was getting hurt. I see a boy who was holding my hand and chasing away all of my fears, I see the boy who stuck by me through everything I put him through. I see a boy is heading for battle, and he's confident about it. He's not shaking or screaming or trying to talk his way out of it. He's doing it not only because it's the right thing, but because he wants to. He's not just another kid; he's something so much more. He's selfless and caring and understanding. He's the only person in the world that matter to me, and he's heading into a battlefield.

"Sam!" I cry out, running to him as fast as my feet can take me, and pull him into the tightest hug I ever gave him. I hold him in my arms, feeling his heart beet rapidly against mine, afraid to let go. I can't let him go out there. I want him to stay here, with me, where he will be a lot safer than out there. But I know he feels he has to go. I know nothing I say will change that. I'd seen that look in his eyes, when he looked at Bumblebee back in that terrible torture room. He feels obligated to do something. He was dragged into this from the beginning, and I know he feels he needs to watch it through to the end.

Pulling away, I lock us in eye-contact, making sure he knows I'm dead serious. "You come back to me, you hear me? You come back to me, in one piece, or I swear, I will go to wherever you are, and I will drag you back by the hair, and I will kill you, you got that?! You come back!" I shout at him. He doesn't flinch back, but only hugs me tighter.

"Raven… I promised you that I will always be with you, no matter what. I'm not planning on breaking that promise. I still gotta see you graduate, and get into college, and kick your ass when you don't show up for the first lecture. I'm not going anywhere," he whispers in my ear, his voice thick with tears.

Pulling away, I turn to Mikaela and Bumblebee. "You to take care of him for me, you hear me? He gets hurt, and I'm holding you two personally responsible."

"Don't worry," Mikaela says with a sly grin, "I won't let him out of my sight. He'll be back to you before you can say his name." I give her a nod of thanks, and, reluctantly, let Sam go, my hand still attached to his.

"Sam!" I cry, before he can turn away. "… Be safe." And with that, I let go of him. And I never saw him that way, and never thought I did; but I guess a small, hidden part of me always looked at him that way. Because I never thought we'd end up in this situation. Because I never realized until now, with his safely truly at stake, how much this green-eye dark-haired boy meant to me. And because I really didn't think it mattered anymore what I do – not now, not today – I call out his name one more time, just as he reaches the car.

"Sam!" He stops again to look at me, a sad look in his eyes. But that look only gives me more courage. Because it doesn't matter to me; because I never knew what he was to me, and how much I needed him; because I realized that he was always more special to me than just a best friend, or a guardian angel. That's why I do it: because I honestly don't care about anything else anymore – or ever, for that matter.

I run up to him, wrap my hands around his neck, and press my lips to his.

**AN: awwwwww! Finally! I like the end of this chapter a whole lot – mainly because she found that little part in herself that always liked her best friend in a non-friend type of way. Yay! Pretty please tell me what you thought of the chapter, because this was 7,785 words long! And I wrote that all in one day! This is a new record for me, so reviews are mandatory, don't you think?**

**Tell me what was your favorite part of the chapter, because I will write similar scenes for you! One of my favorite parts is that she – unlike the rest – doesn't care about the robot; oh no, Raven only cares about the memories on her now-alive phone. I just love making her like that. Does it differentiate her from other OC's that are written into the movies? Please tell me that it does. I want to make her stand out from the rest in all those little ways; it's so fun!**

**Speaking of ants; I based the ant of a drawing I found on deviantart. Here is the link, minus the spaces and with a ".com" between "deviantart" and "/art": **abhijithvb . deviantart / art / robo-ant-2-252246051**. ****Check it out because it's beautiful!  
**

**Anyway, please review and let me know what you thought; tell em what was your favorite part of the chapter, and I will see you all next chapter. Bye!**

**QUESTION OF THE DAY: what is your favorite catchphrase?**


	12. Chapter 12

**AN: alright, so I'm back with another chapter, and I have to apologize for taking this long. I am currently facing this pain in the behind called "real life", and a case of writers block. But I'm good now.**

**Alright, on to something very important: in the last chapter, I asked everyone to tell me whetehr or not you think Raven is a Mary Sue, and no one responded. This is a problem because naturally, I think that you do find her to be a Mary Sue Miss PEerfect. And when I think that my character is like that, I tend to freak out, and re-write the entire story – I've already done that with one of my stories. And believe me, it's a very big pain.**

**I like this srpty, and I don't want to have to re-write it, so I really need your thoughts on this. Even if you do think Raven is a Mary Sue… no, ESPECIALLY if you think that, you gotta let me know, so that I can fix it. I don't like perfect characters, and I don't want Raven to be like that, so I HAVE to know what you think of her.**

**ALSO****: I'm not getting any word from you, and it kind of hurts. Because I try to give you a good sotry, but I get not feedback from you. So can we please try this: I would apreciate four reviews per chapter, if possible, and I will only reply to reviews of more than a hundred and fifty characters. You don't have to leave four reviews, but I would really like it.**

**WARNING: language ahead.**

**P.S. I know nothing about computers, so let's just pretend that Raven sounds like she does, ok?**

**Anyway, please proceed to the story:**

The moment I made the choice, I knew I ruined everything for both of us. I knew that our relationship would never be the same. I knew that there will always be this unspoken moment both of us would remember clearly, but neither of us would mention. I knew that now things will be a lot tenser between Sam and me, but I couldn't help it. There were so many ways in which I knew this was wrong, and I'd expected Sam to struggle or freak out; I'd expected him to push me away, or at least try to move away, himself.

What I didn't expect was for Sam to toss the cube over his shoulder like it was an empty, useless box, in Mikaela's general direction without even making sure she caught it, and wrap his arms around me. Contrary to what I had thought, _I_ was the one who as caught by surprise. My eyes shot wide open in utter surprise and I made a gulping/choking noise somewhere in the back of my throat in shock. I would have expected anything, and I was ready to take it silently; but I was definitely not ready for this. I wasn't ready for Sam to kiss me back, but I was sure as hell not going to complain. Instead, I close my eyes again.

The taste of his lips on mine blinded me to the surrounding world, and I melted into his arms. All that was, was his lips moving against mine, and his arms around my waist, holding me to him, set on never letting me go. And he was kissing me with as much passion as I him. It was uncoordinated and rushed and about a mile off from some of my past experience and I loved every single moment. And I hoped it would never end.

I hear muffled, distant voices, telling us to break it up because we had a world to save. I successfully ignore them all, focusing on nothing that isn't the boy in my arms, and his arms around me. When did I start seeing him that way? When did he suddenly mean so much more to me? I'd seen him in what I had thought to be every angle; I'd seen every one of his faces – the anger, the joy, the fear, the longing, the giddy, the surprise, the love, the hate; I'd seen it all. But this was a side of him I'd never even imagined. This was a side of him I had never seen – never looked at or for in general.

But I did now. And I didn't know why the sudden change, or why he was suddenly this to me, after ten full years. I couldn't bear the thought of losing him, ever, but now it was in a whole new way; a way I couldn't describe. And neither did I care. I cared for nothing at all at the moment.

I didn't care because I was kissing my best friend – a best friend I apparently liked in a very different way.

Then reality hits me in the head like a cargo train and I snap out of the sappy, "pink and ponies everywhere" attitude, and snap my eyes open, pushing myself off Sam as fast as I could, and as harshly as I could, my palms pressed flap against his chest to keep him at an arm's length. Oh Lord above… what did I just do? I stare up at him breathlessly, and let the whole weight of the situation draws on me: I just kissed Sam. Oh my God… how could I do this? "I'm so sorry…" I mumble in shock, and anger at myself, mouth hanging open, eyes wide, breath caught in my throat.

"Come on, hurry up!" I spin around, dashing after the ones who are staying without hesitation, grateful for the interruption. I struggle to catch up, my hands instinctively up near my head, ready to protect it from anything that might decide to fall from the ceiling. "We gotta go! This way!" Simmons shouts, taking lead of the group. Blondie grabs my arm, helping me run faster through the shaking underground of Hoover Dam. I don't turn around to look behind me, and I don't think about what just happened a minute ago; I'm just focused on not tripping and falling and getting caught behind… all alone. I shudder at the thought.

"_Warning!_" a voice announces very loudly over the speakers, heard clearly over the noise. "_NBE-One cryo-containment: failing._" Yeah, I definitely don't want to get caught behind. I push myself faster, Simmons urging us all on, through a maze of more identical corridors and hallways where it is a wonder to _not_ get lost. How long was he studying the place before he can walk around it without being lost for life?

One large room, another, some offices and supply warehouses, and finally he and the official guy are shoving a heavy set of metal doors open with a loud, stressed groan. They whine in protest to the sudden movement, time taking its toll on them. We burst through it into an old-looking room with ice-age ancient computers, covered in a thick layer of dust. Ignoring how much this place needs a serious upgrade, we rush to an old, spider web-covered console, and Simmons getting into a spinning chair. I turn around in time to see the door clap shut loudly, the sound echoing through the room. The old lock falls into place, closing us securely in.

The whole console is covered with a layer of dust, much like everything else in the room, its wires and cables knotted in a confusing mess of colored vines in need of sorting.

"When was this invented? Back when we were throwing rocks and making fire with sticks?" I ask in disgust.

"Right now it's the only thing we've got," Simmons murmurs as he plugs in a few things and flips several switches. I refrain from making a comment on how old he must be if he still remembers how to use it. "Come to me; come on… plug it in over there…" he mumbles as he fiddle with everything. The old machine makes a high-pitched ring that causes me to wince and bring my hands to my ears. "We're hot… we're live!" Simmons exclaims victoriously, but I notice something: this thing doesn't have a built-in microphone or camera. This thing doesn't have _any_ sort of communication outlet. No head-set, not headphones, no anything at all. And that means that we can't communicate.

"Crap," I say under my breath, just as Computer Gook jumps in, voicing my thoughts.

"Where are the mics?" Simmons freezes in place.

Simmons freezes. "Mics?"

"Crap," I repeat, this time louder. "You have this old thing; you'd think it would at least be in its best state for usage!" With that, we all frantically start looking around the room, dashing to a table with a bunch of old, broken commuters, shuffling through it, as everyone else follows in the quest for finding headphones, or a microphone, or something that we can use to transmit a message.

Transmit.

… Transmit…

Transmit! Of course!

I look around, trying to find a useable computer… and there is one, rig over there in a pile of other crap that I can't even name. Running across the room, I slide to a frantic stop next to the table it's on, screaming and squealing and jumping in disgust as I get a few threads of spider web – along with an actually spider, ewe – off of it. I clean the dust off the monitor as much as I could, messing around with the cables until I find the right ones, and… one here… plug this in over… ok, not this other grey one… Wait, where does this one go? I fidget around with it, and then go to dig a keyboard and mouse in a box next to it. I fish out a keyboard that has all the keys still on it, and plug that, along with a ball-mouse – those old things I used to take apart and get the little ball out to play marbles with Sam – into the laundry machine in front of me.

I flick on the fluorescing lights on the table on, making it easier to see and wave my hand over my head.

"Hey… hey Australia!" I shout, wincing at the disrespect of the nickname. "I'm sorry, I forgot your name!" I look up to see her attentions on me. "Come here!"

"I'm Maggie!" She calls out, running up to my side. "What is it?"

"You said you were working for the pentagon; are you a techy?"

"Uh… this stuff… I think I learned about it in history class a few years ago?" she offers. "Why?"

"Do you think we can hotwire this thing to there-" I point at the army console, "- to transmit a message?"

"Glen!" Maggie shouts to her sidekick, getting his attention

"Yeah?" the kid peeps, his voice catching. Ok, third or something time already, in the past few hours. How old is this guy? Is he still in puberty or something? Ok, Ok, I get it! We can pretend to laugh at my lame jokes later.

"Can you hotwire this computer to transmit a tone…" she asked, motioning between it and the console, "… through the radio?"

"What good is that?" he asked in a panicked tone, staring at the two of us like we're two complete weirdoes.

"Morse Code!" I say, finishing her sentence as if it's the most obvious thing in the world. "We can use this old… thing-"

"- To transmit it through _there_," we finish each other's sentence, both on the same thought.

"Ok!" Glen cries out hysterically, climbing out of the spiny chain and rushing over to us. He takes one look at the back of the monitor, running his hand over it once before shouting, "Mr. Simmons! I need a screwdriver!"

"Screwdriver coming up!" Simmons shouts back, as he and Suit dig around though box after box. Maggie – Maggie, Maggie, Maggie, Maggie; ok, now I will remember her name – and I join the search, and soon after, Simmons finds what we are looking for. He tosses it across the room, to Maggie, who catches it with one hand and reaches back, to hang it to Glen.

The dark-skinned boy instantly starts taking the big box apart. I might be good with a computer, but this is prehistoric, so I have no idea where to start. So I watch Glen's hands even closer, imprinting every useful and useless movement into my memory, mapping out in my head every wire he pulls and tugs and moves and replaces.

I clear the desk the computer rests on a little, taking a few of the boxes and some of the junk off, and putting it all on the ground underneath it, and take a seat on one knee on it. I push my hair over one shoulder, leaning a little closer to get a better look, my eyes following every movement, trying very hard to understand the function of every wire and cable as plug I see Glen touch, even by accident, until, "Can you please move away? I can't see past your hair." I blush in embarrassment, and move back, away from Glen's working area.

I watch Simmons and Suit engage in some murmuring conversation, and decide to start one up with Maggie. "So… how long have you been working for the Pentagon?" I whisper, leaning towards her so she can hear – although I've never been good at whispering, so you can hear me from across the room.

"They've noticed me when I was a teenager. Me, and a friend of mine, we both got a letter in grade twelve, saying they wanted us in. We got a scholarship, and an internship, but I only came to the Pentagon for the first time just now; and it's been a year since I started college."

"Ok… now I'm confused. So they recruited you right out of highschool?"

"Yeah. But you know how it is: the young people always get the best of the new technology. My dad was a bit of a techy himself, but he was proud of his huge desk top like this one. He's a bit behind the modern day technology." I snort at that.

"Aren't they all? So let me get this straight: they found your skills useful, asked you in, and now you're like… what? Twenty? And you are already helping them crack globe security threats?" She nods a bit shyly, and I only nod in approval. "Way to go."

"What about you?"

"What about me?"

"I always wanted to go into something centering on computers, but I never thought I'd end up in the Pentagon – although my career there ended yesterday," she adds from in between her teeth, with a stressed sigh. "But where do you wanna go?"

"Um… I have no idea. I can't really go anywhere. I'm not one of those people who follow their dreams and become rich and famous. I'm good in some things, but in the whole… I can kind of see I'm staying at KFC."

"You grew up in that one part of town?" she asks in a sorry tone.

"No; I didn't have anyone to kick me in the ass and send me to school on a daily basis. I smartened up all too late, and now I don't really have a future in anything. And now I don't know when I'll get back to school after this, so I'll definitely miss all my chances to catch up on anything, and have to drop half my classes. I'm not looking at anything very colorful," I say with a shrug.

"Ok, I still have a little to go with this, but I'll need to connect this computer to the radio," Glen says. That's all I need so I get up, off the table, my knee hurting, and Maggie and I walk back to the radio console, talking away as we do.

"Oh come on; sure you've got _some_ plan," she urges, trying to keep the conversation alive. I shake my head at her. "Nope," I tell her, popping the 'P'.

"Well… what do you like? Oh and, by the way… does it look like I'm freaking out? Because I'm totally freaking out," she adds.

"Computers. I really like them. I get into places every now and then, but generally, I just like working with them – figuring out what goes where and how to get them to work better or what programs are operated how. Since I was little, I had this obsession with espionage films and stuff, so I, to this day, hang around at the FBI and CIA and NYPD and all those other national security forces and whatnot. I track down phone calls of criminals, and search through every camera in California, doing a facial search, looking for a match of a wanted felony or something. Then the big people in the office get an anonymous phone call about the location of someone they are looking for," I tell her quietly – or at least what I think is quietly.

"I try hacking Sam's video games and cheat, because he can take me on in x-box in his sleep; or I just sit there in his room, trying to upgrade that same game. Oh, _and_ I'm into computer animating," I add. "I hang out on deviantart _all_ the time." I stress 'all', because I check it several times a day. "I practically live there. I draw, I come up with new application for Photoshop; I several roll models on there; they are absolutely amazing. The amount of detail is unreal, the texture and design are very unique – basically, like I said,t hey are amazing. I have this um… this story I'm writing on ficionpress; I animated a trailer for it. I did it from scratch, no clips from other places, mow internet photos, nothing. It's all my own, and it was a _headche_ it took me two month to animate three minutes!" I complain in exasperation.

"And you don't look like you're freaking out. But for the record: I'm freaking out more. Megatron is in the other room!" I whisper hysterically, frantically pointing at the shut door. He might break in or something! He's looking for a bunch of people to kill after we held him captive for over half a century; what if he saw us run here?

"In order: You do that? No freaking way! I use to do that _all_ the time – I _still_ do, every now and then. I'm totally a geek that way, thanks to Glen," she says, jerking her head back to her sidekick. "I highly doubt that you're freaking out more, because I'm really good at making it look like I'm not freaking out. And finally: maybe you can go into movie animation," she suggests, turning to me and waving her hands around in a suggesting motion.

"Maybe, but allow me to remind you that you need to do well on your SAT's to get into any form of post secondary education. And I am _not_ the kind of person to even show up to do them. And yeah, I know: responsibility. But sorry, but I'm not a responsible person either."

Maggie snorts. "You sound just like Kylie." My head snaps up at the name.

"Who?" I ask, even though I have a fair guess – although it can very well be wrong.

"Kylie is the lead character and narrator in this um… in this novel. It's on this website, where the creator posts short stories and poems, and he or she is writing a novel right now."

"Kylie Webber?" I ask, clarifying to full name of the character.

"Yes; you've heard?" Heard? Darling, I created her. And yes, I did base Kai on myself, but I did that because I wanted her to be believable. An awful lot of online stories done for hobby contain at least one Marry Sue – even when the author doesn't realize it – so I tried to make her as human as I possibly could. And what is more human than the author her/himself?

"I may have. Ink-On-Paper-dot-com, right?"

"Yeah; the name of the website is a _little_ cheesy, but the story is great," she says. Yeah… I'm not very good with names in general – not just remembering, but coming up with them as well. And since Fanfiction, Fictionpress, and Booksie were all already taken, I had to go with something of my own. I must have spent seven days trying to come up with a name for the webpage. It had to be easy to remember, short, simple yet unique and something that would stick with the reader. And then I had to go out and promote it on like Facebook and twitter and my fanfiction account, and my fictionpress account, and a whole bunch of other places. And after a year, I finally have like over half a million subscribers.

And trust me: it was _a lot_ of work. Just making the webpage took a while. I had to come up with a good domain, and design the page, and add links, and give credits to dozens of people and-

"So what about your boyfriend?" Maggie asks suddenly, causing me to freeze up and look at the blonde.

"He's not my boyfriend," I tell her, shaking my head. Her face goes from embarrassed to sorry. "He's been crushing on that really super hot girl – Mikeala – for ever since seventh grade or something."

"Friend zone?"

"I'd been helping him win her over. She and I aren't really friends but we hang out every now and then. I'm his wingman." Maggie winces.

"Ouch; I feel your pain, sweetie"

"No, it's… it's not like that. I mean… I never had a crush on him or anything. It was a heat-of-the-moment type of thing He just kind of went from my best friend since day one of grade one, to my best friend, who I care about far more than I thought, and in a whole diferent way. I just kind of… I don't know," I mumble under my breath, shrugging as I did so.

"I couldn't let him go like that. He was going to do something very, very dangerous, and I was far too chicken to go along. I couldn't let him go without telling him just how much he means to me and just how much I treasure all the times he stuck by me, and it kind of… came out. Except that it came out the wrong way." I look down in shame at what I'd done. I've ruined our age-old friendship, and I knew full well that he had a crush, and wanted to ask her out, and even had the chance. Now I took that all away. Now things will be strange and tense and so many things will be left unsaid, but always remembered.

"Well…" Maggie says we give the radio transmitter, along with the cables attaching it to the console, to Glen, and find our place back where we begun, "If you ask me, he didn't look like he was against it all that much." She gives me a cheeky grin, to go along with a matching wink.

"That's what makes it so terrible, though. Don't you see? I've known him for… _ever_. And I made that mistake, and he made it worse by not telling me to back off. He's supposed to be with Mikaela – the girl of his dreams… literally – not going around kissing his friend." Then in shame, I add, "… Like me."

"You're right… it's just gonna be weird with the two of you. But what about Mikaela? He's been crushing on her for a while; won't she be feeling competitive?"

"I don't know. And quite frankly – and don't get me wrong, she's a nice girl but – I couldn't care less if she was feeling competitive or challenged. She can have him all to herself… as long as she treats him well. He might be a weird boy, but he's still Sam. And Sam is the most wonderful person I know, whether he knows it or not. So she better treat him like there is no other, because there _is_ no other." I trail off a little, dazing off, my gaze focused on empty space. "There never will be."

"This all real cute n'all, but can ya hold this for me?" Glen asks, handing Simmons and I a twist of three wires. I reach over the table, trying to grab it, but it's too far. I shove some things out of my way, hearing them clatter against the stone floor, the sound hauntingly bouncing off the metal walls. I freeze up, waiting for the sound to stop, and then give a guilty, nervous laugh as everyone stares at me.

"Sorry," I squeak, taking my phone – ant – out of my pocket because it's poking my side, and set it on the table, sitting up next to it and hanging the wire over three fingers gently, holding it at eye-level.

"Thanks. Maggie… I need the keyboard connected to the computer, _and_ the radio. Can ye hook it up?"

"Sure," the blonde answers in the Australian accent that makes me so jealous of her. Damn Australians and Brits for their hot accents. I want to have an accent, too! It's so not fair.

Since there is no chair, Maggie gets on her knees to start working, just as I hear a light, high-pitched clicking sound, and look down next to me to see my phone turn into an over-sized ant. It appears to glare at me for a little while, and then goes off, wondering around the table. It examines every bit of junk on the metal table, scanning it, and pocking it, and touching it, and turning it, learning its new territory.

"Put that thing away," Simmons hisses, his eyes – like all ours, except for Glen who is busy – on the ant. "It's freaky."

"I know it's scary, but what do you expect me to do, huh? Scold it and tell it to go stand in the corner? It's not a kid that you can just tell what to do. Beside… it's an ant; there is now way I'm spending more time with it, then I absolutely have to. I have the same reaction towards it as I do towards school." Simmons only snorts. "Oh shut it. As if _you_ liked school," I bite out.

"No; but at least I pretended to make an effort to attend," he fires back. I gasp a little, staring at him for a long moment. Who the hell does he think he is?

"You're a dick," I finally say, and turn my gaze to my lap. I suppose he's right. Look at him now, with a secret government agency, traveling the North American continent in search for extraterrestrial life; all in a suit and with a tie, and with what looks like a good paycheck. And then there is me right next to him, in a pair of three-year-old, self-cut jean shorts – they used to be full-length until about six months ago; that's when I fell and tore them up, so I had to cut them – and a shirt that I forgot to toss in the wash last week. I live in an over-priced, single-bedroom house – which I have to pay for on my own now – that smells like a sewer, I sleep till noon and I can't hold down a job. And don't even get me started on school.

And I have myself to blame for it all. So I guess maybe… no, not 'guess', and not 'maybe'; Simmons is _definitely_ right: he wouldn't be here if he didn't at least put in _some_ effort; and effort is not something I'm used to doing.

"Pass me that," Glen murmurs into the computer as he works, pointing at something on the table. "Almost done…" Simmons picks up the something-meter, reaching it out to the comic-book computer geek when a loud, angry bang on the metal door causes us all to jump. My head snaps to the door, my heart beginning to race.

"What the hell was that?" Simmons asks, frozen into a statue, eyes locked on the door like the rest of us. There is a short hiss before the door is hit with something seemingly heavy and metal. Simmons throws the cord in his hand to me, jumping off his spot on the table, watching the door closely. My breathing and heart rate speed up, and I gulp nervously. In the words of Simmons: what the hell was that? Oh my God… what if it's Megatron, coming for more innocent blood? Oh dear Lord, he's going to kill us all – and we've done nothing wrong! Ok, Simmons did do something wrong, but the rest of us are innocent! We are young – the majority of us – with our entire lives ahead of us! I don't want to die at the hands of an alien warlord! No, scratch that: I don't want to die, period!

"Barricade the door!" Suit shouts, and he, along with Maggie and Simmons, race to the door, shoving it closed as it bounces back and forth, trying to get opened. Maggie runs to get another table – there seems to be an excessive amount of those here – and pushes it, with the help of the men, in front of the door in the hope that it will do more good than their bare hands. Instinctively, I pull my legs up on the table, wrapping my free arms around them to wrap myself into a tight ball.

"Don't stare; work faster." I urge Glen to get his eyes off the door and on the computer in front of him.

"I got it, I got it," he tells me, his voice shaking.

"Go help the others," I tell him, throwing my legs over to the other side to the table and get down on the floor next to him. He gives me an 'are you frikin crazy?!' look, which I wave off with a retort of my own.

"I'm a helpless woman; go and protect me!" I hiss in a terrified, shaking tone, shoving him up and away from me, taking his place in front of the keyboard. Oh God oh God, oh God! Please don't let whoever it is, get in! "Ok, you guys keep that thing, whatever it is, busy, ok?" I ask the room, not caring if anyone heard, and get straight to work. Alright… let's access the military…

I let my fingers work their magic over the old keyboard, my typing about half as fast. They keyboard is large, and the button pop out of it, and are far away. I'm not used to it – it's so unlike the built-in keyboard on my laptop. It's very loud, and hard to press, and the buttons won't cooperate with me as they should. Oh why does this all have to be so out-dated?

4, 5, 6, 4, 6- I jump as I hear glass smash, and look up to see Suit break a glass box and take out one of 'em huge army guns with the rounds the size of cigars. My gaze shifts to Maggie and Simmons, who are frantically piling up anything and everything their hand touch in front of the door. But whatever is on the other side is just to strong; not matter who big the pile gets, the door still flies open, hits the stuff in the way, and flies closed again, only to repeat the process. I shriek, jumping backwards, the chair nearly falling over. I start hyperventilating, panting in fear and panic, eyes wide, my throat thick. Please just let me live, just let me live, _just let me live_!

Right! 7, 5, 2… tupdy-du pi-pta…

"Put some rounds in!" Suit shouts, but I don't let it interrupt. 2, 9… master search… The screen flares to life, the glowing green writing of last century lighting the monitor, a soft buzzing static sounding as it does. The ant, feeling frightened, apparently, crawls over to the monitor, and climbs onto my hand – ewe, ewe, ewe! – quickly crawling up my arm, and onto my shoulder, and I have to fight the urge to swipe it right off me and toss it at a wall as hard as I could. It jumps down onto my lap, and I wriggle in place, squirming at its cold, metal body on my legs. Oh my God, this is so very gross! I am never touching a bug again!

"We're…" I choke out, "W-we're in!" Someone get this thing off me before I vomit all over it! My stomach is barely holding its acid inside – since other than that, it's basically empty since yesterday morning – as it is. I don't need an insect climbing all over me! I look up, waving both hands over my head, to see Simmons and Maggie trying to fight off whatever is on the other said of the door, while Glen screams like a girl off to the side, looking out of place, and confused, and scared – a mirror image of what's happening to me inside. It's by pure miracle that I hadn't begun screaming, myself.

Suits comes running my way, shouting, "Transmit exactly as I say!" I give a panicked, rushed, wide-eyed, frantic nod, my heart racing as fast as my mind. I let out a small squeak of understanding, but my eyes stay glued to the couple at the door. I watch in awe as Simmons gets a flame-thrower from somewhere – where the hell did he get that from?! – and scream "Get out of the way!" to Maggie, before sticking it in the gap between the doors, and giving a battle cry. "DAMN YOU, SON OF A BITCH!" he screams, moving away from the door and what's on the other side tries to get in. From behind Suit, I see exactly _what_ it is that's assaulting us all: the Little Monster.

I let out a scream as the memories of last night – and the entire day – resurface. It's that thing that tried to kill Sam; that thing that jumped out of the huge monster and tried cutting Sam up; the one that left several cuts and scrapes on my arms with its sharp, pointy body when I tried to hold it down while Sam got away from the little Terror.

"I thought Mikeala hacked you uh into a jigsaw!" I scream at it from my seat in horror. How the hell did he come back?! What if it remembers me? What if it goes after me? Worse yet: what if it goes after Sam?! How did it get here? "The last time I saw you, Sam kicked your head across a football-field worth of distance! Don't you know that when you die, you STAY dead?!" Ok, now I'm officially freaking out.

Maggie charges her modified Mossberg 590 with M93A Stock, and shoots at it. Has she been taking badass classes and not telling me, or something? Because with that top, and _those_ cutoffs, to go with the heels and that messy, falling apart, post-apocalyptic-looking ponytail and stressed expression on her face, she is totally the most kick-ass blonde in the history of the world. And I don't mean to sound a bit gay, but she's totally hot right now.

"This is defense secretary Keller!" Suit – Keller? Oh thank _goodness_ I now know his name; about frikin time! – shouts to me, and I get to transmitting his every word. "Connect me to the air force commander-"

"-Ahhhhh!" I scream, jumping back and falling over on my chair as something silver, and something **_fast_** flies right past my face, hits the wall next the computer, bounces off and flies back around, just as another one of whatever the hell it is flies overtop me – now on the floor, moaning in agony – elsewhere. I don't follow where it went or what it was for a long moment, instead focusing of how frikin much my back hurts from falling on a back of a hair, and how much my head hours from hitting it in the cement floor.

We all freeze for a moment, looking between each other on shock, before Glen's cracking, freaked out voice squeaks, "What the hell was that?!" I scramble to my knees, feeling something warm and tickly on the back of my leg and squeal in protest, trying frantically to get it off, and listen to Keller at the same time – which is harder than you'd think, giving that _I have something on me_! In a room full of flying metal shit and spiders and other icky stuff I don't want to think about, it could be anything! What if it's a poisonous spider, or a radioactive spider, or really just any spider?! It made thinking very flipping _hard_!

"Authenticate emergency action: Blackbir 5. We need air strike for the following coordinates!" He gives me a set of coordinates, and I enter, and re-enter the entire message three times before sending it because my shaking fingers won't cooperate, and I keep missing keys, of hitting the wrong ones. My hands shake like I'm out in the middle of a Canadian winter in the clothes on me right now.

"Got it!" I cry out in victory when I get the message out, and then look around to realize that it's deathly quiet. You know what they say about silence being golden until you have a kid; and when you do have a kid, silence is very bad news? That's what I feel like right about now. The silence would have meant that everything is ok, in _any_ other context. But now, the quiet only means we are in even deeper shit than we were ten seconds ago.

Can today get any worse?

Apparently so, because a loud, metallic clang is heard form one of the pipes overhead, followed by clicking, and croaking. I gulp loudly as Keller aims his gun at the ceiling, making his way to Simmons, and the two heroes of the day stand guard, watching the pipes, guns ready to fire. I don't like Simmons one bit, but right now he's the one with the big gun, so if he can get me out of here alive I swear I'm gonna kiss him!

"This is so not good…" Said agent murmurs. I swallow thickly, not taking my eyes off either of them. They charge their guns just as another bang makes my hear jump to my throat, and I clap my hands over my mouth and nose, trying to hold my breath – it usually helps when I'm panicking. They simultaneously shoot at where the clang came from, the sound echoing over and over again through the room… along with a very girly screech on my part. Another bang, followed by two loud shots, and then one of the pipes explode, and the little Monster falls out, landing on another pipe in a crouch. Maggie and I both scream, diving away from it, and find each other in a shaking, terrified hug under the table I was at… or should I say I was trying to hide behind her. Simmons and Keller start shooting at it, and I watch in horror as it jumps down, falling awkwardly into a glass case, and it shatters into a thousand pieces.

I flinch away, even though he was across the room, as the monster gets out. We use the desk we are at as a barricade of sorts, Simmons, Glen, and Keller joining us, and shooting at it, before ducking back down, a shot ranging out and papers flying everywhere. Maggie peaks out, before crying out in fear, and ducking back down to safety.

"He's behind the pillar!" she shouts, her voice shaking beneath the brave façade she tries to put on – for what reason, I don't know. As Keller and Simmons stand up to shoot, shots from the area of the said pillar around, sending dust and wall debris flying everywhere. Shot after shot after shot, on both sides

"Shoot that muthafuc-!" Glen screams, but it is cut short by a pair of what looks like ninja stars flying past us, and sticking in the wall.

"Maggie! Cover fire!" Simmons orders, tossing her his gun. Above me, I hear a familiar ticking/clicking, and look up at the monitor to see a response being written out on the scream. But just as I get up to look, a shot right over my head sends my screaming for my life. Praying my fingers are spared, I clear the screen from the dust that flies everywhere, and carefully take a quick peek at it, diving back for cover, and shout, "The air force is responding!"

The monster shoots at us again, and I look around, to see Maggie shooting at it, but Simmons nowhere in sight. By force of habit, I stand up, looking around for him, and find him behind a wheeled rack, armed with the flame thrower once more, cursing the monster. Oh... there he is; never mind, I found him. Maggie gets up to shoot at it once more, only to scream and duck back down as two metallic disks fly past her, towards me. I scream, and duck as well, my heart racing at a crazy speed.

"Oh my God, Oh my God, _Oh my God_; we're all gonna _die_!" I cry, becoming seriously hysterical. Then I notice that it's quiet again – really, _really_ quiet. I jump back up stupidly, even though I know I can be blown to bits, to see what's going on, only to find the monster's head missing once more. He croaks "Oh shit" – or something along those lines – before falling to the floor in a pile of shiny metal.

"_Yes_!" Glen cries out, and I look next to me to see his face in the screen. "They're sending F-22's to the city!" My brain takes a moment to respond to that, and when I finally catch up – when we all catch up – we break out into a loud choir of cheers.

"_Yeah_!" Simmons shouts, punching the air. "In your _face_, mother fuckers!" We all get out of our hiding places, clapping and cheering and whooting that the monster is dead, and we got the message out to the air force, and they are sending out a strike team, and that we are all unharmed.

We all pant tiredly, looking around at each other with huge victory smiles. "That little fuck had better be dead now," I say, pointing at the monster. "Mikaela hacked him up with a power saw last night. Apparently that wasn't enough to get rid of him.

"Oh he's dead alright," Simmons spits – literally – at the monster lying in a tangled pile at our feet.

"What should we do with him?" Maggie asks.

"He's under S-7 jurisdiction now. We lock it up, away from the world, some place he won't be causing any damage," Simmons tells us all.

"That or we could just send him through a shredder of some sort, and cut him up, and scatter the parts," Glen suggests in between breaths. "Like a vampire or something." I make an "I agree" expression, nodding in support.

"Yeah, I say we crush it and dump it someplace… bury it under ground or something."

"And where is the fun in that, eh? We gonna just hide it away? Nah, that ain't no good. Now if it were still alive, I'd watch that; but it ain't kicking anymore. We gotta at least try to get some good out of it," Simmons retorts tiredly.

"Hey… you ok?" Maggie asks me breathlessly. I give her a nod and a smile, but her smile drops the moment I turn to face her. "Ok, Raven… I need you to look at me, ok? You alright, you hear me?" The tone of her voice suggests that I should be freaking out all over again, and I freeze up, mentally looking for what's wrong with me, trying to feel if I'm hurt.

And as if on cue, my upper right arm begins to throb. My eyes widen in shock as the pain grows to a burn and then just plain horrible pain down my entire arm – and something warm and wet streaming down it. I let out a pained whimper, and my eyes shoot down to my arm.

Of course… I ducked after Maggie. There were two discs. I think I found the one that didn't kill the monster: it's lodged deep in my arms.

My whimper turns into a sharp cry of pain.

**AN: dun, dun, duuuuuuuuun.**


End file.
